Computex is one of the biggest technology events in the world, where many of the world’s leading technology manufacturers come together to announce and showcase their newest offerings.
With the Covid-19 pandemic bringing social events to a halt for the last couple of years, this year’s Computex marks a return to its in-person events. And with some announcements made at this year’s show, it certainly was an exciting one for PC gamers and enthusiasts.
Let’s look at some highlights from Computex 2022 in Taipei.
Intel
With all the other big tech companies at this year’s Computex, you might expect to see one of the biggest players in the tech space there. After all, with the highly-anticipated Intel Arc cards purportedly on the horizon, and the Raptor Lake-S processor slated for a Q4 2022 release, surely they’d be there to strut their stuff, right?
Sadly, Intel did not show up to Computex this year. Some speculate that the company couldn’t make it due to Taiwan’s Covid-19 restrictions, while others have speculated that there’s trouble behind closed doors regarding Intel’s Arc cards.
Whatever the case may be, it’s certainly a notable absence at such a big event. However, the event still had plenty of other big announcements.
AMD
AMD set the pace for Computex 2022, offering the first keynote of the event. And it had some big announcements.
First, it announced a new quad-core, 8 thread APU with RDNA 2 graphics, the “Mendocino”, for laptops in the $399 to $599 price range. It also officially announced its SmartAccess Storage, a competitor to Nvidia’s RTX IO, which aims to improve loading times and texture streaming for games.
But the biggest announcement came last – the upcoming Ryzen 7000 series CPUs. These 5nm CPUs introduce the new AM5 standard, and operate on the Zen 4 Core architecture. Along with the new line of processors, it unveiled a series of new flagship motherboards from the likes of ASUS, ASROCK, Gigabyte, MSI, and BIOSTAR.
NVIDIA
Despite being one of the biggest players in the tech space, most of Nvidia’s presentations proved rather lackluster for gamers. Most of its keynote revolved around AI technology, robotics, and their new data center Grace CPU architecture.
Of course, Nvidia did have some good news for gamers towards the end, though not what many hoped for.
First, it announced that 12 more games will receive DLSS compatibility. It also announced that Icarus, My Time At Sandrock, Warstride Challenges, and Soda Crises would all receive updates to implement Nvidia’s Reflex technology.
Nvidia also announced the ASUS ROG Swift 500Hz G-Sync gaming monitor. The monitor only has a 1080p resolution, but it’s also geared towards e-sports, utilizing both Nvidia’s Reflex Analyzer and ASUS’s new “eSport TN” technologies to purportedly offer 60% better response times than other comparable monitors on the market.
ASUS
ASUS stood out during Computex 2022 with a number of announcements. It was featured during both AMD and Nvidia’s keynotes, first with its ROG Crosshair X670E Extreme, one of the flagship AM5 motherboards ushering in the next generation of PC hardware. Then, during Nvidia’s keynote, the ROG Swift 500Hz G-Sync gaming monitor was announced.
It also announced a number of notebooks and a new tablet for gamers. This includes its first gaming tablet, the ROG Flow Z13, as well as the ROG Strix SCAR 17 SE laptop, which will come packed with a 12950HX, using a custom vapor chamber and liquid metal thermal compound for maximum cooling.
ASUS also revealed the return to the Zephyrus G14 laptop series with a new 2022 model, as well as the ROG Zephyrus Duo 16, a return to their dual-screen gaming laptop lineup.
MSI
Making its debut during the AMD keynote as one of the flagship AM5 motherboard manufacturers, MSI announced three new next-gen motherboards: the MEG X670 and X670E (premium), MPG X670E Carbon Wi-Fi (mid-range), and the Pro X670-P Wi-Fi (business).
It also announced other hardware during the event. This includes updated iteration of the RTX 3090 Ti with the Tri Frozr 2 cooling system, and the MAG Trident S cloud gaming desktop, which will focus on cloud and mobile gaming.
But perhaps one of the biggest surprises from MSI was when it set itself to take on Alienware in the gaming monitor space. That’s because it quietly announced the MEG 342C QD-OLED display, a 175Hz curved QD-OLED gaming monitor. It’s only the second of its kind, with its only competition so far being Alienware’s AW3423DW curved QD-OLED gaming monitor.
ASRock
ASRock’s Taichi series motherboards are among their most popular and premium models. So it comes as no surprise that, when the veil was lifted on the new AM5 flagship motherboards, ASRock was at the front of the pack.
ASRock revealed that it has two variations of its newest motherboard in the Taichi series that will make their debut later this year. Those are the X670E Taichi, sporting a sleek but standard, all-black finish, and the X670E Taichi Cararra, offering a gorgeous marbled white finish.
Like all the flagship motherboards, these boards boast impressive specs but remain near the front of the pack, with 26-phase power delivery, dual full-length PCIe 5.0 slots, PCIe 5.0 and 4.0 M.2 slots, and plenty of other current and future-gen technologies.
Gigabyte
Gigabyte was another among those featured during AMD’s keynote, and has announced four new motherboards for the X670 lineup: the Aorus Xtreme, Aorus Master, Aorus Pro AX, and Aero D. Of all the boards, only the Aorus Xtreme is confirmed to feature PCIe 5.0 graphics and M.2 slots, since the X670 standard only requires a Gen5 M.2 slot.
But Gigabyte also showcased a couple other notable products.
The first is Project Stealth Kit, which aims to simplify the computer assembly experience by making it easier to manage and hide cables with a proprietary interface.
There was also the AORUS Model S, a small and sleek mini system that packs an Intel 12th gen i7-12700K CPU, Nvidia RTX 3070 graphics, and two 2 TB PCIe Gen4 M.2 SSDs into an impressively compact case.
Samsung
While the ASUS ROG Swift was probably the biggest announcement for upcoming monitors, it was far from the only one. Samsung introduced three new monitors: the 25 and 27-inch G4 monitors, and the Odyssey Neo G7.
The G4 monitors are similarly specced, with the only difference between the two being screen size. These 240Hz monitors feature FullHD IPS panels with a 400-nit brightness rating and 8-bit color depth.
The Odyssey Neo G7, the premium model among the three announced monitors, offers a 32-inch 4K curved VA panel, running at 165Hz with up to 1000 nits of brightness.All three are also compatible with Nvidia G-Sync and AMD Freesync, and have incredibly low response times, making them great for competitive gamers.
LG
Much like Samsung, LG unveiled three new monitors for gamers: the 32-inch 32GQ950 and 32GQ850 Nano IPS displays, and the 48-inch 48GQ900 OLED display.
These three monitors from the LG UltraGear lineup offer a great balance between colors, contrast, brightness, and refresh rates. And they’re also overclockable.
The 32GQ950 comes in at a 4K resolution and 144Hz/160Hz OC refresh rate, while the 32GQ850 is a QHD monitor with 240Hz/260Hz OC refresh rate. Meanwhile, the 48-inch behemoth, the 48GQ900, is a 4K OLED display operating at 120Hz/138Hz OC that offers a stunning 0.1-millisecond response time.
Each of these three monitors also supports Nvidia G-Sync and AMD FreeSync Premium, with the 32-inch models supporting FreeSync Premium Pro.
Corsair
Last, but certainly not least, Corsair also made some waves at Computex during the AMD keynote with the announcement of Corsair’s first ever gaming laptop, the Voyager a1600.
Corsair’s new 16-inch machine features a 240Hz WQHD+ screen, and is packed with top-tier AMD hardware, housing both a Ryzen 6000 series processor and a Radeon RX 6000 series GPU. It also comes with up to 64GB of RAM and 2 TB of storage.
But the Voyager a1600 isn’t just special because it’s Corsair’s first laptop. It’s also being touted as a “truly mobile streaming solution”, which is a bold statement considering most gamers do their streaming on desktop PCs.
