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ATI Radeon 9700 Dissected

Posted by michael on from the stay-alert-and-keep-your-soldering-iron-handy dept.

Bender writes "The guys who laid out the future of real-time graphics a while back have now dissected ATI's Radeon 9700 chip. Their analysis breaks down performance into multiple components--fill rate, occlusion detection, pixel shaders, vertex shaders, antialiasing--and tests each one synthetically before moving on to the usual application tests like SPECviewperf and UT 2003. You can see exactly how this chip advances the state of the art in graphics, piece by piece. Interesting stuff."

7 of 192 comments (clear)

  1. Well ATI is on top... for now by Gooner · · Score: 3, Insightful

    The big question for an ATI part is how are those drivers. In addition, it looks like going to .13 micron is helping slow Nvidia down for the NV30 but that is a bump in the road ATI will hit too.

    1. Re:Well ATI is on top... for now by Alan+Partridge · · Score: 2, Insightful

      Unfortnately, it's not JUST him. The level of childishness in this market can be easily seen by the number of ludicrous names given to various gaming products such as "detonator" "annihalator" "eliminator" etc etc etc ad nauseam

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      That was classic intercourse!
  2. Re:ATI Still the Best by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Insightful

    I find using a separate TV card works quite well for the same purpose, and when I upgrade my video card for better performance, I don't have to worry about paying a premium for one with TV functionality built in - you're essentially paying for that TV functionality over and over again, whereas a cheap hauppage PCI tv card could be used through several generations of main graphics cards.

  3. How about Xfree86 ? by Fred_A · · Score: 4, Insightful

    The real question for those of us who don't run Windows is how well it works in X. What it ATI's attitude towards open source ? Are their specs public ? Do they provide drivers ? In short is there a reason to switch from nVidia when I upgrade ?

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    May contain traces of nut.
    Made from the freshest electrons.
    1. Re:How about Xfree86 ? by StArSkY · · Score: 4, Insightful
      Goto the ATI web site. Just Click on "Built by ATI" in the Drivers section, choose Linux/Xfree86 and then Radeon 9700 Pro, and there yah have it. Their approach is not perfect, but at least theyconsider it, and actively support the 2d side. As for 3d... Doesn't look to promising...

      IF you can't be bothered with the clicks, look here

      --
      lounge around on the blue couch
  4. I found its weakness! by Niadh · · Score: 2, Insightful

    off ATI's site: RADEON 9700 PRO 128MB AGP $399

    Not to dog on ATI or Nvidia but 400 bucks for a video card is just to much. Sure it can pump out 200+ fps but it kind of gets pointless after 30. what can the humen eye sample at? 24 fps(guess) or so? Cards like this are made to stroke egos, and mine is big enough. I can only pray it doesn't fall into the wrong hands (sucky gamers that cry lag).

  5. Re:110 million transistors of joy by Dark+Lord+Seth · · Score: 2, Insightful

    If you can afford dual LCD screens then surely another PSU most be well withing your financial grasp...

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    Hate me!