Sony has demonstrated the face-recognition and tracking capabilities of the upcoming PlayStation Vita handheld, using the portable console’s front-facing camera to track head movement and have on-screen avatars respond accordingly. In the demo, filmed by Siliconera and which you can see after the cut, Sony showed a two-way video chat being held between a pair of animated avatars, the head, mouth, eye and other movements being mapped to those of the gamer.

Although head-tracking has been done before, the system Sony demonstrated was able to track minor details like eye-blinking and eyebrow twitches, for a more lifelike animation. Sony wasn’t saying a video calling app would necessarily be the final use of the technology, 4gamer reports, but that the software was merely a demonstration of the power of the Vita’s abilities and its potential in augmented reality (AR) gaming.

Rather than using specific glyphs that can be identified and tracked by an AR system, Sony’s Yoshikatsu Kanemaru suggested that objects and even people could be distinguished by the Vita and have computer-generated graphics overlaid. It’s a technology that appears to have borrowed from Sony’s previous SmartAR research, which can intelligently spot unique elements -such as posters, magazines or more complex forms, like body outlines – in the camera’s frame and then track them accordingly.

All of the boards in the series use the dual intelligent Processors 2 tech with DIGI+ VRM power delivery for precision power adjustment and control. The boards also provide extra DRAM power to increase stability and has a feature packed BIOS. It sounds like the family will be overclocker friendly.

The mainboards also supports SATA 6Gb/s storage interface with RAID 0/1/10 support. The chipset in the boards also supports USB 3.0 natively with no need for a secondary controller. Intel still lacks native support for USB 3.0 and all Intel chipset boards are using a secondary controller for USB 3.0 ports. There is no word on when these boards will land and how much they will cost.

The recent refresh of the GeForce GTX 460M into the 560M was a welcome one, bringing Optimus support and higher clocks to what's liable to be their crown prince of budget mobile gaming. The GTX 560M is beginning to materialize in the market, but we were still left with an odd hole in NVIDIA's lineup at the top. That hole has now been filled, and thankfully it's at least a little more than the usual speedbump that goes along with a new moniker these days. Now every part in the 500M series can switch over to Sandy Bridge's integrated graphics while running on the battery, offering the best of both worlds.

NVIDIA's new top dog is the GeForce GTX 580M. Every spec on the press sheets is listed as "up to," but that's really par for the course. While NVIDIA's reps declined to comment on what chips are being used for the GTX 580M, you'll find the specs are a dead giveaway. The 580M seems to be a mobile version of the GF104/114 (more likely GF114), with 384 CUDA cores, with a main clock of 620MHz (yielding 1240MHz on the shader cores). Riding shotgun is a 256-bit memory bus supporting up to 2GB of GDDR5 clocked at an effective 3GHz. Those of you keeping score at home will note that's an improvement of 45MHz on the core (and thus 90MHz on the shaders), with the memory speed remaining constant. All told I'd expect performance in the neighborhood of the desktop GeForce GTX 460 1GB version (or at least, the original NVIDIA spec): not too shabby, but still an incremental improvement on the shipping GTX 485M. The major selling point is, again, Optimus support in the 580M.

On the heels of the GTX 580M is the GeForce GTX 570M. The 470M was a bit of an oddity in that while the 480M and 485M were easy enough to find, the 470M was largely a rarity. While the 580M sees the minor speedbump we've come to expect, the 570M is a major improvement over its seldom-used predecessor. The 570M likely uses the same silicon as the 580M (which is, again, more than likely a GF114), but while the 470M only had 288 CUDA cores, the 570M gets a healthy upgrade to 336. The 470M's 535MHz core clock also sees a boost to 575MHz, with the shaders clocked at 1150MHz. The 570M still retains the 470M's 192-bit memory bus, and will be configured with either 1.5GB or 3GB of GDDR5 clocked at an effective 3GHz, a marked improvement on the 470M's 2.5GHz memory clocks. All told performance should be somewhere between the desktop GeForce GTX 460 768MB and the GTX 460 SE. For mobile gaming, that's still not bad at all, and again it benefits from Optimus support.

NVIDIA also was able to point out specific models of notebooks that will be shipping with these parts. Availability in 17" Clevo notebooks should surprise no one, with the P270WN in particular supporting both 3D Vision and SLI'd GeForce GTX 580M's. Alienware's new M18x (which we have en route for review) will also be supporting the GeForce GTX 580M in SLI. And finally, the MSI GT780R shown above will be shipping with the GeForce GTX 570M.

NVIDIA expects notebooks featuring the new GPUs to be available for order from OEMs today.

Razer is back and that DeathAdder mouse is getting dressed up for fans of the Transformers franchise. The mice are for the tie in to the new flick that opens this week in theaters everywhere. The DeathAdder comes in both Autobot and Decepticon versions with the good guy mice in red for Optimus Prime and yellow for Bumblebee. The bad guys are in silver for Megatron and purple for the new baddies that pop out of the dust on the moon.

All of the mice have the same 3.5G sensor and 3500dpi sensitivity. You can pick up any of the four designs for $69.99 each. To complete your Transformers desk swag you can also get a Transformers Vespula dual sided gaming mouse pad with Optimus on one side and Megatron on the other for $44.99. Razer also has a line of laptop sleeve cases in Transformers style for $49.99 each.

Enermax’s PSU’s have rarely disappointed us, and models such as the Galaxy and Revolution have picked up more than a few awards over the years as a result. The Revolution 85+ 1.25kW has held its place in Custom PC as our choice for extreme overclocking for quite a while. However, this month sees the return of PSU testing to bit-tech, and the Revolution 85+ series now has some competition.

The Enermax MaxRevo 1350W is one of the most powerful PSUs we’ve tested, and boasts a fearsome list of specifications. It sports Enermax’s post-shutdown cooling, called HeatGuard, which keeps its own fan, your PC’s fans and even any water-cooling pumps operating for up to a minute after your PC shuts itself down to help dissipate heat. All of its power cables are modular too; while everyone will need to use the 24-pin ATX connector, it’s far easier to connect this to the PSU separately after you’ve installed it.

In terms of cooling, the MaxRevo is equipped with a large 139mm Enermax Twister fan located in the base of the PSU, which is protected by a black grille. It spins at 900rpm when it starts up and tops out at 2,000rpm. This fan proved to be very quiet indeed, even at 100 per cent load.

As far as cables and connectors are concerned, the MaxRevo has enough of them to power a monster of a PC. There are eight 6+2-pin PCI-E connectors, 14 SATA power connectors, ten Molex connectors, an 8-pin EPS12V connector and two 4-pin ATX12V connectors. The SATA and PCI-E connectors are also spread over eight individual cables, with the remainder spread over a further four cables (12 individual cables in total). This enables you to easily trim the amount of cables you need for your particular setup. As a result, cable tidying shouldn’t be quite as daunting as it might first appear – if you don’t need all the SATA or PCI-E power cables, you can simply leave any unnecessary cables in the box.

Sadly, while all the cables are of sufficient length (even the shortest cables stretch to 50cm), they haven’t been braided particularly well. There’s a good inch of bare power cables near the connectors on most of the cables, and the 24-pin ATX connector in particular lacks any braid or heatshrink for a good 4in at either end, meaning that it looks quite unsightly.

However, as you would expect, there’s plenty of power on offer. The MaxRevo has six 12V rails, each of which is able to supply up to 30A with 112A available in total from the six rails. In theory, this brings the total power available from them to a staggering 1,344W, although that wouldn’t leave you any room in your power budget for anything else. Meanwhile, the 3.3V and 5V rails are each able to dish out up to 25A, with 140W available between them.

Measuring 180mm deep, the MaxRevo is also slightly larger than mid-range PSUs, which is worth bearing in mind if your case has limited clearance behind its PSU mount. It’s still much smaller than the lumbering Enermax Galaxy of old, however.

Specifications
Rails 3.3V = 25A, 5V = 25A, 12V1 = 30A, 12V2 = 30A, 12V3 = 30A, 12V4 = 30A, 12V5 = 30A, 12V6 = 30A, -12V = 0.5A, 5VSB = 4A
Maximum combined output 1.35kW
Connections 24-pin ATX, 3x 4-pin ATX12V, 8-pin EPS12V, 8x 6+2-pin PCI-E, 14x S-ATA, 10x Molex, 1x FDD
Cooling 139mm intake fan
Dimensions (mm) 150 x 180 x 86 (W x D x H)

In addition to the P10 line, be quiet! will launch the Straight Power E9 series in September. These will also be modular PSUs, with 80 Plus Gold certification and prices similar to their predecessors. The most interesting feature could be their 135mm Silent Wings fan. Previously, they have had models with up to 120mm. be quiet! also presented a model called Efficient Power for the international market that will be less expensive than the E9 and P10 series.