While desktop PC power supplies receive the bulk of enthusiasts’ attention for good reasons – not the least of which being the vast selection of options that comes from being a standardized part – power supplies as a whole aren’t just a concern for big PCs. With the majority of PC sales having flipped to notebook sales some years ago, notebook power supplies already lead the market in volume. And while most laptops don’t need the kind of massively powered PSUs that dominate the desktop space, even that is slowly changing as desktop replacement-class laptops increasingly grow in performance and power consumption.
Perhaps the poster-child for the high-performance, high-powered laptop is Eurocom, who has a long history of developing heavy-duty DTR laptops that are all but portable desktop systems. Following recent trends in GPU power consumption and in GPU popularity for both gaming and AI workloads, the company has been selling a range of “mobile supercomputers”, which are practically large, tailor-made laptops that rival even the best of desktop computers – and have the power requirements to match.
In order to power their own high-end laptops, Eurocom has developed a rather unusual 780W AC adapter for high-performance laptops. Intended to power the most powerful of powerful laptops, their latest power adapter can supply over three-quarters of a kilowatt of DC power; a desktop-like wattage for a desktop-like device. It’s a laptop power adapter that’s unique in its scale, and with some room to scale up even further.
| Eurocom 780W AC Adapter Power specifications |
|
| RAIL | +20V |
| MAX OUTPUT | 39A |
| 780W | |
| DIMENSIONS | 325 x 110 x 40mm, 1.38kg |
| AC INPUT | 90 - 264 VAC, 50 - 60 Hz |
| MSRP | PSU: $299, Cable: $129+ |
Eurocom has offered this adapter for a few years now. But it’s taken on a new life as more laptops have been released that use such a large adapter (or two smaller 300W-ish power adapters). And, critically, Eurocom has made additional DC cable/connector sets for other manufactuers’ laptops, significantly increasing the number of systems it’s compatible with. Currently, Eurocom offers DC cables for the following laptops:
Externally, the Eurocom 780W AC adapter looks like a hybrid between a PC PSU and a laptop adapter. It is shaped like an oversized laptop AC adapter but has a metallic body and cooling vents/fans. Eurocom advertises that it weighs “only 1.34kg”, which is the weight of an entire 14-inch laptop by comparison, but is relatively lightweight for a PSU with that kind of power output. The company logo is debossed across the top side of the adapter, with four round anti-slip pads found at its bottom. Care needs to be taken while moving it around because the metallic edges and weight can spell trouble for wooden surfaces.
Eurocom installed a small information display on the AC adapter, which shows the current, voltage, and power output, as well as the temperature of the adapter. It is not perfectly accur... Cases/Cooling/PSUs
Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co. this week released its financial results for Q1 2024. Due to a rebound in demand for semiconductors, the company garned $18.87 billion in revenue for the quarter, which is up 12.9% year-over-year, but a decline of 3.8% quarter-over-quarter. The company says that in increase in demand for HPC processors (which includes processors for AI, PCs, and servers) drove its revenue rebound in Q1, but surprisingly, revenue share of TSMC's flagship N3 (3nm-class) process technology declined steeply quarter-over-quarter.
"Our business in the first quarter was impacted by smartphone seasonality, partially offset by continued HPC-related demand," said Wendell Huang, senior VP and chief financial officer of TSMC. "Moving into second quarter 2024, we expect our business to be supported by strong demand for our industry-leading 3nm and 5nm technologies, partially offset by continued smartphone seasonality."
In the first quarter of 2024, N3 wafer sales accounted for 9% of the foundry's revenue, down from 15% in Q4 2023, and up from 6% in Q3 2023. In terms of dollars, TSMC's 3nm production brought in around $1.698 billion, which is lower than $2.943 billion in the previous quarter. Meanwhile, TSMC's other advanced process technologies increased their revenue share: N5 (5 nm-class) accounted for 37% (up from 35%), and N7 (7 nm-class) commanded 19% (up from 17%). Though both remained relatively flat in terms of revenue, at $6.981 billion and $3.585 billion, respectively.
Generally, advanced technology nodes (N7, N5, N3) generated 65% of TSMC's revenue (down 2% from Q4 2023), while the broader category of FinFET-based process technologies contributed 74% to the company's total wafer revenue (down 1% from the previous quarter).
TSMC itself attributes the steep decline of N3's contribution to seasonally lower demand for smartphones in the first quarter as compared to the fourth quarter, which may indeed be the case as demand for iPhones typically slowdowns in Q1. Along those lines, there have also been reports about a drop in demand for the latest iPhones in China.
But even if A17 Pro production volumes are down, Apple remains TSMC's lead customer for N3B, as the fab also produces their M3, M3 Pro, and M3 Max processors on the same node. These SoCs are larger in terms of die sizes and resulting costs, so their contribution to TSMC's revenue should be quite substantial.
"Moving on to revenue contribution by platform. HPC increased 3% quarter-over-quarter to account for 46% of our first quarter revenue," said Huang. "Smartphone decreased 16% to account for 38%. IoT increased 5% to account for 6%. Automotive remained flat and accounted for 6%, and DCE increased 33% to account for 2%."
Meanwhile, as demand for AI and HPC processors will continue to increase in the coming years, TSMC expects its HPC platform to keep increasing its share in its revenue going forward.
"We expect several AI processors to be the strongest driver of our HPC platform growth and the largest contributor in terms of our overall incremental revenue growth in the next several years," said C.C. Wei, chief executive of TSMC.
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