CPUs return to AI spotlight as agentic workloads reshape data center demand; Perplexity plans to adopt Nvidia’s Vera

As AI workloads pivot toward emerging needs for systems that can perform tasks with a coordinated balance between speed and control, the hardware race is moving beyond GPUs. While the critical role GPUs have played across the AI compute landscape is not in doubt, the expansion of inference, reasoning, and agentic AI is placing CPUs back at the center of the AI hardware race.

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ViewSonic VX27G60Z-2K goes official with a 240Hz QHD QD-OLED display

ViewSonic VX27G60Z-2K is the fourth monitor from the QHD VX27G60Z lineup that’s been launched in the past eight months. This particular model has a 26.5-inch QD-OLED display with a QHD resolution and a 240Hz refresh rate. The native 10-bit color depth panel covers 99% of the DCI‑P3 color gamut, ensuring accurate, saturated color reproduction for both gaming and content creation. HDR performance…

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Exec pleads no guilty in Singapore over alleged smuggling of Nvidia chips to China

Alan Wei Zhaolun, an executive at Aperia Group, pleaded not guilty in a fraud case alleging that he and three others illegally misrepresented themselves to obtain servers containing Nvidia chips before rerouting them to China. He has been accused by Singaporean prosecutors of money laundering and other charges, as Singapore emerges as a hub for illicit AI chip flows to China.

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Microsoft AI data center faces Wisconsin lawsuit over noise and light pollution

Microsoft’s US$7.3 billion Fairwater AI data center in Wisconsin is facing a class-action lawsuit from nearby residents over alleged noise, light pollution, dust and heavy truck traffic. The complaint, filed on July 1, centers on the Sturtevant and Mount Pleasant areas and highlights growing community concerns around large-scale AI infrastructure.

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Exclusive: Geckos bets on AI materials beyond nano copper powders and CPO waveguides

As generative AI drives rapid growth in high-performance computing (HPC) demand, the semiconductor industry is shifting from process-node competition to materials competition. Geckos chairman Raymond Shen said that once chip manufacturing advances to 2nm and beyond, improvements in AI computing power are no longer just a chip-design issue, but are increasingly constrained by materials’ heat dissipation and high-frequency signal transmission capabilities.

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