Nvidia is one of the world’s biggest computer chip companies, best known for its line of graphics processing units or GPUs. Although the firm had its start in the world of consumer gaming, in recent years it’s grown into a true tech titan with diverse investments in self-driving cars, cloud computing, supercomputing, and artificial intelligence. The parallel processing power of Nvidia’s GPUs has proven to be particularly good at machine learning tasks, and its chips are in high demand not only from AI researchers but any business with an interest in artificial intelligence. From 2015 onwards, Nvidia’s share price grew sharply, allowing the company to make some key acquisitions, including UK chip designer ARM, which it announced it would purchase in September 2020 for $40 billion. Nvidia was founded in 1993 by Jensen Huang, who is currently the firm’s CEO. Known for his leather jackets and upbeat corporate presentations, Huang is a familiar figure to anyone interested in tech.
ARC Raiders, the upcoming extraction shooters from the makers of The Finals, debuts later this month, and Nvidia is ready. Today’s Game Ready driver (version 581.57) includes support for ARC Raiders, Pax Dei, The Outer Worlds 2, and Vampire: The Masquerade - Bloodlines 2. It also has fixes for Steam overlay stability issues, Black Myth: Wukong graphic glitches, and Madden 26 stability problems.
Battlefield 6 is arriving next week and Nvidia is releasing a Game Ready driver update just in time. The latest 581.42 release (download here) is optimized for both Battlefield 6 and FBC: Firebreak’s Breakpoint Update.
Battlefield 6 launches on October 10th with support for DLSS 4 Multi Frame Generation, DLSS Super Resolution, DLAA, and Nvidia Reflex.
Still trying to figure out why Nvidia just announced it’s investing $100 billion in OpenAI? The answer’s simple: it has too much money, and nothing else to spend it on. We’ve all been there.
[wsj.com]
National Economic Council Director Kevin Hassett tries to explain why the Trump Administration allowed Nvidia to sell AI chips in China in exchange for a 15 percent cut.
“What sort of involvement did the Trump Administration have in this agreement?” asked the FT’s Michael Acton on the call. Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang:
The Trump Administration had no involvement in the partnership at all, and they would have been very supportive, of course. And today I had the opportunity to tell Secretary Lutnick, and he was very excited, very supportive of seeing American technology companies working together.
I’m on the call where Nvidia and Intel are explaining their $5B deal, but the call began with a hot mic:
His majesty was delightful. The cognac was excellent, but just not enough of it. I guess the cognac was from 1912.
Huang joined Trump’s state visit to London this week.
It’s just a preliminary ruling by China’s competition regulator so there’s no penalty yet as the investigation continues. The ruckus stems from Nvidia’s 2020 acquisition of Mellanox, which China approved on conditions that included guaranteed supplies to China.
Asobo Studios has updated Microsoft Flight Simulator 2024 to include DLSS 4 Multi Frame Generation support. RTX 50-series owners will be able to enable up to 4x Multi Frame Generation, while RTX 40-series GPUs can still enable the regular Frame Generation support with DLSS 4.
Nvidia has released a new Game Ready driver (581.15) today that’s optimized for the upcoming Indiana Jones and the Great Circle update that will introduce RTX Hair. It’s the first game to use spheres to improve Harrison Ford’s virtual hair instead of triangles. RTX Hair is designed to improve lighting and shadows, all while maintaining performance in the game and not taking up too much extra memory.
In the company’s Q2 2026 earnings, Nvidia specifically says the RTX 5060 “quickly became NVIDIA’s fastest-ramping x60-class GPU ever.”
So we’d best get ready for more of this:
In May, I wrote how Nvidia’s RTX 5060 review debacle was a stain on its reputation, and the company also experienced major political pressure from both China and Trump since — but the company, yet again, had its best quarter ever for Q2 2026. $26 billion in pure profit, too: another record.
The cloud gaming service will launch in the country in November, Nvidia says.
This four-fan GPU is the “ROG Matrix GeForce RTX 5090 — ASUS Graphics Cards 30th Anniversary Edition.” Reminds me a bit of the motorcycle from Akira with its red design and wheel. Asus says it’s inspired by the 2008 ROG Matrix 9800 GT. You can’t buy this one; you have to win it.
Nvidia didn’t provide specific model names, but it’ll be a native app for monitors and TV with 5K120 and 4K120 HDR streaming. “No Android TV devices, no Chromecast, nothing, run it directly on the television,” says Nvidia product marketing director Andrew Fear. More on GeForce Now’s big upgrade:
I thought it breathed new life into the Steam Deck even in my 60Hz tests — but next month, Nvidia’s adding its promised new mode that matches the Steam Deck OLED’s 90Hz refresh rate, too. Also, you’ll be able to stream some games with the power of an RTX 5080.
Nvidia is returning to Gamescom this week and it’s holding a “community update” stream today that promises new GeForce features, some “major GeForce Now news,” and the chance to see some “highly anticipated PC games.” No new hardware will be announced, though. Nvidia’s stream kicks off at at 12PM PT / 3PM ET on YouTube and Twitch.
Look at this thing. According to Videocardz and Tom’s Hardware, it’s a custom 12.5-inch 4K handheld with Intel i9-14900HX and Nvidia RTX 4090 chips from a gaming laptop. There are pics and a video of it playing games, but none showing the build or internals.
Obviously, I want it.
White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt said the details of Trump’s plan to take a 15 percent cut of Nvidia and AMD’s chip sales to China are “being ironed out by the Department of Commerce,” CNBC reports. Leavitt also added that the charge “could expand in the future to other companies.”
Amid reports that Nvidia and AMD will be given permission to sell AI chips to Chinese companies only if they pay the US government a 15 percent cut, some ask how exactly the money solves the national security risks.
oghowie:
So it’s a national security issue unless you give us a cut?
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The Financial Times first reported on this “highly unusual” arrangement that is part of reopening the gate for Nvidia and AMD to sell previous-gen AI chips to companies in China:
The US official said Nvidia agreed to share 15 per cent of the revenues from H20 chip sales in China and AMD will provide the same percentage from MI308 chip revenues. Two people familiar with the arrangement said the Trump administration had not yet determined how to use the money.
After years of the US casting doubt on Huawei tech for alleged security threats, now China gets a turn. The country’s Cyberspace Administration reportedly called Nvidia execs in to explain “loopholes and backdoor” vulnerabilities in the H20 AI chips designed specifically to sell in China. It follows an antitrust investigation opened last year.
Then again, this could all be posturing — China wants its own chip industry to thrive, and Nvidia’s dominance makes that difficult.
[asia.nikkei.com]
