Date:
Tuesday , October 17, 2006
Author:
Brent Justice
Editor:
Kyle Bennett
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ATI Radeon X1950 Pro

ATI is announcing a new sub-$200 video card that includes new CrossFire technology advancements enthusiasts have wanted. No dongles or masters here. We explore real-world gameplay with both single and dual-GPU configurations in the latest games.

Introduction

This fall, 2006, we have been seeing some fierce competition between NVIDIA and ATI. In fact, it hasn’t even been a full two months since ATI’s last product announcement, the ATI Radeon X1950 series family, yet here we sit today ready to tell you all about another new video card from ATI. In fact, this will not be the only video card being announced this month from ATI either. Understand that these are still DirectX 9 Radeon X1000 series GPU based and not ATI’s next generation technology. We do hope to see that eventually, but it doesn’t appear to be on the radar anytime soon.

If you refer back to our evaluation of the ATI Radeon X1950 XTX you find what made the X1950 XTX unique. It was the first video card to use GDDR4 memory technology and push the memory clock speeds up to a very fast 2 GHz frequency. Our testing showed this was by far the fastest single-GPU video card, and even rivaled the NVIDIA’s dual-GPU video card. The ATI Radeon X1950 XTX also introduced a new cooling solution that is much more quiet and efficient at cooling. ATI also introduced another new video card, the Radeon X1650 Pro. This video card however does not use GDDR4, instead it is simply a faster clocked Radeon X1600 XT, but labeled with the “X1650 Pro” moniker. ATI’s thinking here is that there will be faster video cards in the Radeon X1650 series to come, and indeed there will be with that announcement later this month. Today however ATI is expanding on the new Radeon X1950 series.

ATI Radeon X1950 Pro

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The ATI Radeon X1950 XTX was the first video card announced in that series, and now, ATI is hard-launching the ATI Radeon X1950 Pro. As the name implies the X1950 “Pro” will be slower than the X1950 “XTX”. What makes this video card very exciting is the price point that ATI is putting this video card at. The ATI Radeon X1950 Pro sits at the $199 USD price level. This is a very appealing price point for many folks. The ATI Radeon X1950 Pro will replace the likes of the Radeon X1800 GTO and Radeon X1900 GT, both of those video cards are being phased out.

Even though the video card is labeled under the Radeon “X1950” series it does not use GDDR4 memory, instead it uses GDDR3. The Radeon X1950 XTX is still the only video card to use GDDR4. The Radeon X1950 Pro is based on the exact same architecture as the Radeon X1900/X1950 XTX. However, the pixel shader processors have been reduced to meet the $199 price point. The ATI Radeon X1950 Pro has 36 pixel shader processors and 8 vertex shader units. For comparison the Radeon X1900/X1950 XTX has 48 pixel shader processors and 8 vertex shader units.

The core frequency is set at 575 MHz and the memory at 1.38 GHz for the Radeon X1950 Pro. 256MB of GDDR3 on a 256-bit bus is standard. On each video card will be two dual-link DVI ports and AVIVO support. This video card will also support HDCP. ATI is stating the power draw for a single X1950 Pro to be around 75W, and in CrossFire 150W. Looking at the clock speeds and pixel shader configuration you may think that this is just a slightly faster X1900 GT, but looking further you will find this is an entirely new GPU.

The Radeon X1950 Pro is the first GPU to be based on the 80nm process technology. All other ATI Radeon X1000 series products are at 90nm, including the competition. The reduction in process helps reduce power leakage, power draw and heat. This video card is single-slot. Since ATI has built a new ASIC for this video card they were able to include another very exciting piece of technology in this GPU. The Radeon X1950 Pro includes ATI’s new Native CrossFire technology.