Alongside today’s CES-centric announcement of their new GeForce RTX 30 series parts for laptops, NVIDIA also offered an in-depth reveal of their next desktop graphics card, the GeForce RTX 3060. Reflected the continued progression of the Ampere architecture into smaller and cheaper video cards as NVIDIA continues its product stack rollout, the RTX 3060 marks the introduction of Ampere into their popular mainstream-enthusiast 60-series video card tier. Long the backbone of NVIDIA’s desktop sales in North America and elsewhere, the 60-tier cards typically strike a solid balance between price and performance. And with prices set to start at $329, at launch the RTX 3060 will become the cheapest RTX card that NVIDIA has ever offered.
Once it’s launched next month, the GeForce RTX 3060 will mark the next step in the progression of NVIDIA’s Ampere-based desktop cards. Though the company already launched the GeForce RTX 3060 Ti last month – using a cut-down GA104 GPU – the RTX 3060 is the real McCoy in terms of being a 60-tier card. It’ll be the cheapest that NVIDIA has ever launched an RTX series card, and it will be the card that they hope will entice owners of GTX 1060 series cards, one of NVIDIA’s most successful card series of all times, to finally upgrade to an RTX card.
The release of the RTX 3060 comes on the heels of what was a fragmented product lineup in the last generation. Owing in large part to the significant die space requirements for NVIDIA’s RTX family of features – ray tracing, tensor cores, etc – NVIDIA bifurcated their lineup at the 60 level. At $349 we had the RTX 2060, which was a decent card, but not especially impressive on a price/performance basis. Alternative, the GTX 1660 series of cards offered much better pricing for only a small drop in performance, but these cards lacked the hardware RTX features that are now becoming a baseline as part of the DirectX 12 Ultimate specification.
As a result, NVIDIA is undertaking a reintegration of sorts with its GeForce lineup. While we don’t have any direct visibility into what comes after the RTX 3060, the smaller die sizes afforded by Samsung’s 8nm process mean that NVIDIA isn’t facing the same pressure to bifurcate. So for the moment, at least, the RTX 3060 is taking the mantle as the true successor to NVIDIA’s 60-tier of video cards. And with that comes the need to please both performance and budget enthusiasts, a tall order for a card that is set to start at $329.
NVIDIA GeForce Specification Comparison
RTX 3060
RTX 3060 Ti
RTX 2060
GTX 1060
CUDA Cores
3584
4864
1920
1280
ROPs
64?
80
48
48
Boost Clock
1.78GHz
1.665GHz
1.68GHz
1.709GHz
Memory Clock
14Gbps? GDDR6
14Gbps GDDR6
14Gbps GDDR6
8Gbps GDDR5
Memory Bus Width
192-bit
256-bit
192-bit
192-bit
VRAM
12GB
8GB
6GB
6GB
Single Precision Perf.
12.8 TFLOPS
16.2 TFLOPS
6.5 TFLOPS
4.4 TFLOPS
Tensor Perf. (FP16)
51.2 TFLOPS
64.8 TFLOPS
51.6 TFLOPS
N/A
Tensor Perf. (FP16-Sparse)
102.4 TFLOPS
129.6 TFLOPS
51.6 TFLOPS
N/A
TDP
170W
200W
160W
120W
GPU
GA106
GA104
TU106
GP106
Transistor Count
?B
17.4B
10.8B
4.4B
Architecture
Ampere
Ampere
Turing
Pascal
Manufacturing Process
Samsung 8nm?
Samsung 8nm
TSMC 12nm “FFN”
TSMC 16nm
Launch Date
02/2020
12/02/2020
01/15/2019
07/19/2016
Launch Price
MSRP: $329
MSRP: $399
MSRP: $349
MSRP: $249
Founders $299
At this point I’m still chasing down more detailed product specifications from NVIDIA, as the press material they’ve published so far isn’t entirely comprehensive. But at a high level, NVIDIA is confirming that the GeForce RTX 3060 is based on a new NVIDIA GPU, which following their’s usual product cascade is GA106. It does not appear that this is a fully-enabled GA106 part – the RTX 3060 Laptop GPU offers slightly better specs – but for the moment we don’t know what a fully-enabled GA106 might look like.
In any case, the RTX 3060 as it’s shipping will come with 28 SMs enabled, for a total of 3584 FP32 CUDA cores. Everything else in Ampere should be in proportion to NVIDIA’s usual layout, so this means there will also be 112 TMUs, 112 tensor cores, and 28 RT cores. Meanwhile, as NVIDIA has bound the number of ROPs to the SMs (or rather, the GPCs that encompass them), it’s not clear right now how many ROPs the card will offer, but 64 or a good fraction thereof is a good bet at this point. The card itself will ship with a base clockspeed of 1.32GHz, and a rated boost clock of 1.78GHz.
On paper, this means the RTX 3060 will offer around 80% of the RTX 3060 Ti’s shader and texture performance, with the card’s relatively high boost clock helping to make up for the overall lack of SMs. Meanwhile the impact to ROP performance remains to be seen.
On the memory side of matters, GA106 introduces a smaller 192-bit memory bus, which is comprised of six 32-bit memory controllers. This is standard fare for 60-tier cards, and does come with some trade-offs, mainly in terms of memory capacity. At three-quarters the size of the bus on the likes of the RTX 3070, NVIDIA normally opts to include three-quarters the memory, which would have been 6GB. However as a 6GB card is looking kind of long in the tooth when game consoles have 16GB of total memory, likely impacting the card’s long-term performance prospects, NVIDIA has decided to finally bite the bullet and make the jump to 12GB of VRAM on their mid-tier video cards. The net result is that there’s currently an odd progression/regression in the GeForce RTX 30 lineup – going from 12GB down to 8GB and then back up to 10GB on the RTX 3080 – but at the end of the day it ensures the RTX 3060 ships with enough VRAM to be useful for years to come.
On this memory bus NVIDIA is placing GDDR6 memory, which is what they’ve done for all of the cards below the RTX 3080. NVIDIA’s official specifications don’t spell out what speed grade of GDDR6 is being used here, but going by the many (many) vendor RTX 3060 card announcements in my inbox, I’ve seen cards with memory as slow as 14Gbps GDDR6, which is consistent with what NVIDIA did for the RTX 3060 Ti as well. In that case, it gives the RTX 3060 a total memory bandwidth of 336GB/second.
With lower performance and memory amounts, TDP is also dropping accordingly relative to the higher-end RTX 30 series cards. NVIDIA is rating the RTX 3060 at 170 Watts, which is 30W below the RTX 3060 Ti, and making this the first RTX 30 series card with a sub-200W TDP. However, much like the other RTX 30 series cards, TDPs are rising on a generational basis. Whereas the GTX 1060 was a 120W card and the RTX 2060 a 160W card, RTX 3070’s 170W TDP is a further 10W higher. If nothing else, this is consistent with what NVIIDA has done with this entire generation of cards.
Partner Cards & Product Positioning
While NVIDIA has kept things relatively low key for today’s unveil since the card is still several weeks from shipping, there hasn’t been any word from NVIDIA that they’ll be shipping a Founders Edition of the card. So the RTX 3060 looks to be the first Ampere card that’s getting a purely virtual hardware launch, with NVIDIA’s AIB partners providing custom designs right out of the gate.
Consequently, specific power figures and display I/O options look like they’ll vary some. But at the end of the day, most cards should offer 3 DisplayPorts and an HDMI part, or a similar configuration. Meanwhile, expect to see plenty of factory overclocked cards, as AIB vendors will look to further stratify their RTX 3060 cards into multiple tiers between $329 and the $399 RTX 3060 Ti.
The sole slide of partner cards that NVIDIA has posted says a lot of what to expect from partner card designs: lots and lots of dual and triple fan open air coolers. For better or worse, this is the tried and true cooler method for mid-range cards, and the board partners are apt to recycle proven designs – especially if they’re pin-compatible.
As always, NVIDIA is targeting an N + 2 upgrade cycle with these latest cards, meaning that the company is particularly pitching them as an upgrade for Pascal (GTX 10 series) owners. Along with the significant feature differences afforded by two generations of improvements – things like RT cores and tensor cores, HDMI 2.1 ports and AV1 decoders – there should also be a sizable performance advantage for the newer cards. Though for NVIDIA’s own figures they’ve opted to focus in part on features, only posting a couple of benchmark results without DLSS/RT enabled. Still, the roughly 2x performance gain is right around what we’d expect over the GTX 1060, given what we’ve seen from the earlier Ampere cards.
The bigger challenge for NVIDIA is likely to be enticing those Pascal owners to upgrade in light of the higher prices that all of the RTX cards over the last two generations have fetched. The baseline GTX 1060 6GB hit the market at $249 a bit over 4 years ago, so $329 for its Ampere-based successor is a stiff price increase. Mind you, all of the RTX 30 series cards have faced a similar challenge, but it’s really once we get to 60-tier cards that NVIDIA’s regular customer base becomes increasingly focused on perf-per-dollar.
Pragmatically speaking, given what we’ve seen over the last few months, NVIDIA shouldn’t have too much trouble there. The RTX 3060 Ti flew off the shelves at $399, and as it’s even cheaper, the RTX 3060 will probably fly off the shelves even faster. In fact, keeping the card on shelves (and at MSRPs) is likely to be NVIDIA’s biggest problem for the next quarter. Computer hardware shortages remain a fact of life across the industry, and that’s especially the case for the latest-generation video cards. With plenty of gamers looking to upgrade, and the specter of cryptocurrency mining overshadowing the entire GPU landscape, fast GPUs remain hard to come by. Which for NVIDIA and its partners mean they’ll be able to move everything they can make, but it means gamers will want to remain on their toes if they hope to get a video card.
The GeForce RTX 3060 will be launching in late February. We’ll have more news as NVIDIA sets a release date and its partners announce the rest of their RTX 3060 series launch cards.
The federal government is ordering the dissolution of TikTok’s Canadian business after a national security review of the Chinese company behind the social media platform, but stopped short of ordering people to stay off the app.
Industry Minister François-Philippe Champagne announced the government’s “wind up” demand Wednesday, saying it is meant to address “risks” related to ByteDance Ltd.’s establishment of TikTok Technology Canada Inc.
“The decision was based on the information and evidence collected over the course of the review and on the advice of Canada’s security and intelligence community and other government partners,” he said in a statement.
The announcement added that the government is not blocking Canadians’ access to the TikTok application or their ability to create content.
However, it urged people to “adopt good cybersecurity practices and assess the possible risks of using social media platforms and applications, including how their information is likely to be protected, managed, used and shared by foreign actors, as well as to be aware of which country’s laws apply.”
Champagne’s office did not immediately respond to a request for comment seeking details about what evidence led to the government’s dissolution demand, how long ByteDance has to comply and why the app is not being banned.
A TikTok spokesperson said in a statement that the shutdown of its Canadian offices will mean the loss of hundreds of well-paying local jobs.
“We will challenge this order in court,” the spokesperson said.
“The TikTok platform will remain available for creators to find an audience, explore new interests and for businesses to thrive.”
The federal Liberals ordered a national security review of TikTok in September 2023, but it was not public knowledge until The Canadian Press reported in March that it was investigating the company.
At the time, it said the review was based on the expansion of a business, which it said constituted the establishment of a new Canadian entity. It declined to provide any further details about what expansion it was reviewing.
A government database showed a notification of new business from TikTok in June 2023. It said Network Sense Ventures Ltd. in Toronto and Vancouver would engage in “marketing, advertising, and content/creator development activities in relation to the use of the TikTok app in Canada.”
Even before the review, ByteDance and TikTok were lightning rod for privacy and safety concerns because Chinese national security laws compel organizations in the country to assist with intelligence gathering.
Such concerns led the U.S. House of Representatives to pass a bill in March designed to ban TikTok unless its China-based owner sells its stake in the business.
Champagne’s office has maintained Canada’s review was not related to the U.S. bill, which has yet to pass.
Canada’s review was carried out through the Investment Canada Act, which allows the government to investigate any foreign investment with potential to might harm national security.
While cabinet can make investors sell parts of the business or shares, Champagne has said the act doesn’t allow him to disclose details of the review.
Wednesday’s dissolution order was made in accordance with the act.
The federal government banned TikTok from its mobile devices in February 2023 following the launch of an investigation into the company by federal and provincial privacy commissioners.
— With files from Anja Karadeglija in Ottawa
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Nov. 6, 2024.
LONDON (AP) — Most people have accumulated a pile of data — selfies, emails, videos and more — on their social media and digital accounts over their lifetimes. What happens to it when we die?
It’s wise to draft a will spelling out who inherits your physical assets after you’re gone, but don’t forget to take care of your digital estate too. Friends and family might treasure files and posts you’ve left behind, but they could get lost in digital purgatory after you pass away unless you take some simple steps.
Here’s how you can prepare your digital life for your survivors:
Apple
The iPhone maker lets you nominate a “ legacy contact ” who can access your Apple account’s data after you die. The company says it’s a secure way to give trusted people access to photos, files and messages. To set it up you’ll need an Apple device with a fairly recent operating system — iPhones and iPads need iOS or iPadOS 15.2 and MacBooks needs macOS Monterey 12.1.
For iPhones, go to settings, tap Sign-in & Security and then Legacy Contact. You can name one or more people, and they don’t need an Apple ID or device.
You’ll have to share an access key with your contact. It can be a digital version sent electronically, or you can print a copy or save it as a screenshot or PDF.
Take note that there are some types of files you won’t be able to pass on — including digital rights-protected music, movies and passwords stored in Apple’s password manager. Legacy contacts can only access a deceased user’s account for three years before Apple deletes the account.
Google
Google takes a different approach with its Inactive Account Manager, which allows you to share your data with someone if it notices that you’ve stopped using your account.
When setting it up, you need to decide how long Google should wait — from three to 18 months — before considering your account inactive. Once that time is up, Google can notify up to 10 people.
You can write a message informing them you’ve stopped using the account, and, optionally, include a link to download your data. You can choose what types of data they can access — including emails, photos, calendar entries and YouTube videos.
There’s also an option to automatically delete your account after three months of inactivity, so your contacts will have to download any data before that deadline.
Facebook and Instagram
Some social media platforms can preserve accounts for people who have died so that friends and family can honor their memories.
When users of Facebook or Instagram die, parent company Meta says it can memorialize the account if it gets a “valid request” from a friend or family member. Requests can be submitted through an online form.
The social media company strongly recommends Facebook users add a legacy contact to look after their memorial accounts. Legacy contacts can do things like respond to new friend requests and update pinned posts, but they can’t read private messages or remove or alter previous posts. You can only choose one person, who also has to have a Facebook account.
You can also ask Facebook or Instagram to delete a deceased user’s account if you’re a close family member or an executor. You’ll need to send in documents like a death certificate.
TikTok
The video-sharing platform says that if a user has died, people can submit a request to memorialize the account through the settings menu. Go to the Report a Problem section, then Account and profile, then Manage account, where you can report a deceased user.
Once an account has been memorialized, it will be labeled “Remembering.” No one will be able to log into the account, which prevents anyone from editing the profile or using the account to post new content or send messages.
X
It’s not possible to nominate a legacy contact on Elon Musk’s social media site. But family members or an authorized person can submit a request to deactivate a deceased user’s account.
Passwords
Besides the major online services, you’ll probably have dozens if not hundreds of other digital accounts that your survivors might need to access. You could just write all your login credentials down in a notebook and put it somewhere safe. But making a physical copy presents its own vulnerabilities. What if you lose track of it? What if someone finds it?
Instead, consider a password manager that has an emergency access feature. Password managers are digital vaults that you can use to store all your credentials. Some, like Keeper,Bitwarden and NordPass, allow users to nominate one or more trusted contacts who can access their keys in case of an emergency such as a death.
But there are a few catches: Those contacts also need to use the same password manager and you might have to pay for the service.
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Is there a tech challenge you need help figuring out? Write to us at onetechtip@ap.org with your questions.
LONDON (AP) — Britain’s competition watchdog said Thursday it’s opening a formal investigation into Google’s partnership with artificial intelligence startup Anthropic.
The Competition and Markets Authority said it has “sufficient information” to launch an initial probe after it sought input earlier this year on whether the deal would stifle competition.
The CMA has until Dec. 19 to decide whether to approve the deal or escalate its investigation.
“Google is committed to building the most open and innovative AI ecosystem in the world,” the company said. “Anthropic is free to use multiple cloud providers and does, and we don’t demand exclusive tech rights.”
San Francisco-based Anthropic was founded in 2021 by siblings Dario and Daniela Amodei, who previously worked at ChatGPT maker OpenAI. The company has focused on increasing the safety and reliability of AI models. Google reportedly agreed last year to make a multibillion-dollar investment in Anthropic, which has a popular chatbot named Claude.
Anthropic said it’s cooperating with the regulator and will provide “the complete picture about Google’s investment and our commercial collaboration.”
“We are an independent company and none of our strategic partnerships or investor relationships diminish the independence of our corporate governance or our freedom to partner with others,” it said in a statement.
The U.K. regulator has been scrutinizing a raft of AI deals as investment money floods into the industry to capitalize on the artificial intelligence boom. Last month it cleared Anthropic’s $4 billion deal with Amazon and it has also signed off on Microsoft’s deals with two other AI startups, Inflection and Mistral.
