Tom's Hardware Unfiltered: Computex 2026, Day 0 — peek behind the curtain to see how we're covering the biggest trade show of the year

Tom's Hardware has covered hundreds of press events, and for a long time, you've always seen the finished product. You've always seen the dizzying number of articles coming from events. But what is it really like to cover Computex 2026?

Our staff on the ground are peeling back the curtain to offer you unprecedented insight into how the proverbial sausage is made. Tom's Hardware Unfiltered: From travel to urgently dashing around Taipei, and of course, quick thoughts about the things that we're seeing directly from the show. After each day, we're compiling our thoughts on what we've seen, including any trials and tribulations we've faced amid our incredibly busy schedules.

The show hasn't even kicked off, and there's still a slew of news to get through, so be sure to check out the fruits of our labor. With all that said and done, it's time to kick things off with Day 0 of our War Room dispatch.

Paul Alcorn: Editor-in-Chief

I arrived in Taipei in the blistering heat after three flights and 22 hours in transit, a grueling trip as usual, but luckily, I arrived in the evening and had no appointments. After a half-decent night’s sleep, I headed to the Acer demos to check out their new Intel G3 Extreme-powered handheld and dig up some new info on Qualcomm’s Snapdragon C platform. Acer had the laptop dutifully locked behind glass to keep curious press away from toying with the system, but I happened upon a demo unit that a Qualcomm rep was showing around. A few seconds later, and I had the Windows Task Manager open to peep the unreleased info on the eight-core CPU and its GPU. I’ll be writing up those details tonight as I wait for Nvidia’s pre-brief, which is inconveniently scheduled for 12:30 am Taipei time. That’s going to make for a long day tomorrow.

Joe Shields: Staff Writer, Components

I arrived in Taiwan around 05:40 AM on Sunday after a 17-hour flight from Ohio (five to Seattle, 12-plus to Taipei. Flying that long and being stuck inside a cigar tube, a large one at least, was better than expected, but it’s still an incredibly long flight. Traveling from the airport to the hotel by train (MRT) was easy (most signs have English writing!) and offered great views of Taipei along the way. Even though Computex hasn’t officially started, I have a meeting with Asus this afternoon, with most meetings and roundtables running Tuesday through Thursday. I’m looking forward to sleeping and heading to one of the many night markets (Shilin, one of the largest) to check out the local wares and try new foods before things get hectic later in the week.

Jake Roach: Senior Analyst, CPUs

The first day of Computex is all about getting ready for the rest of the week. My travel day was some 20 hours, leaving in the evening on Friday and arriving after 4 AM on Sunday in Taiwan (the time travel is a trip). After getting off the flight and taking a quick shower (important), I grabbed my MRT pass for the week and my badge. It’s about a 13-hour time difference for me in Taiwan, so I spent most of the day trying to get on a decent schedule so I can be ready to go when the event kicks off properly tomorrow. I was able to get my hands on the Acer Predator Atlas 8, one of the handhelds with Intel’s new G3 Extreme chip, and it’s pretty impressive. 60 fps at 1080p with High settings and no upscaling in Forza Horizon 6 is no joke.

Matt Safford: Managing Editor

After more than 20 hours of travel, my first day in Taipei started with debit card complications and was punctuated by some brief hands-on time with Acer’s Intel G3 Extreme-powered Predator Atlas 8 and Aspire Go 15. Both are interesting, but just how interesting depends on two key things we don’t know yet: performance and price. After Acer, I visited the Guanghua Digital Plaza neighborhood to grab some general photos for Computex blogs and daily announcement wrapups. Between searching for an ATM that worked with my card and walking between Taipei Metro stops, I walked nearly 13 miles, drank more iced coffees than I can count, and I am very happy to let exhaustion take me into the arms of tomorrow.

Jeffrey Kampman: Senior Analyst, Graphics

My travel to Taiwan was one of the smoothest and most comfortable international flights I’ve ever had (thanks to the quiet engines and relatively humid cabin of the Boeing 787), so I was able to get plenty of rest before arriving at 5 AM local time. I immediately set up shop in a Starbucks near my hotel to hammer away at an embargoed review for a few hours before migrating back to my hotel room as soon as it was ready so I could shower, nap, and continue that work. I was glad for the jet-lag-incurred naps, as our Nvidia pre-brief ran from 12:30 AM to 1:30 AM Monday morning prior to Jensen Huang’s keynote at 11. No rest for the weary…

In a world where nobody is launching truly new graphics cards, my Computex week will almost certainly be defined by data center products, integrated graphics processors, and AI accelerators of various shapes and sizes. Intel has already taken the wraps off its Arc G3 handheld platform, and rumors around Nvidia’s N1X and N1 platforms are as thick as the humidity here. If those launches come to pass, we’ll be looking at a very different consumer PC and mobile graphics landscape after this week.

I haven’t been back to Taiwan for over five years at this point, so I’m excited to see what’s the same and what’s changed since my last Computex.

While the show has yet to officially start, our team on the ground will be keeping you up-to-date with everything they're up to this week. Needless to say, things are very busy, so stay locked in on Tom's Hardware Unfiltered tomorrow for our next update.