Introduction

December 2004 was a very exciting time for ATI enthusiasts. On the first of the month ATI announced five new products: the RADEON X850 XT Platinum Edition, RADEON X850 XT, RADEON X850 PRO, RADEON X800 XL, and finally, the RADEON X800. Each of these cards would have been compelling new entrants in the video card market on their own, the fact that all five were announced on the same day made the announcement even more dramatic.

The release of the RADEON X800 and X800 XL in particular were of significant importance, as both cards hit price points that ATI had overlooked with their initial R420 (X800 family) launch back in April. With 16 pipelines, a 400MHz core clock speed and 256MB of 500MHz GDDR3 memory, the X800 XL not only filled a gap in ATI’s product lineup at the important $300 price point, it did so with very compelling performance. The X800 XL’s closest direct competitor, NVIDIA’s GeForce 6800, ships with lower clock speeds and with fewer pipelines. It’s actually better equipped to take on NVIDIA’s more expensive GeForce 6800 GT. Meanwhile, ATI’s RADEON X800 was the first card to bring 12 pixel pipelines and a 256-bit memory interface to the sub-$300 video card market.

X850 XT PE AGP and GeForce 6800 GT PCI-E

Label on the back of the AGP card

Of course, you can’t forget the RADEON X850 XT Platinum Edition. Sitting at the top of ATI’s lineup, the X850 XT Platinum boasts a 540MHz clock frequency, the highest in the industry, and 256MB of 590MHz GDDR3 SDRAM, another industry high. The X850 XT PE card is built around ATI’s newer R480 core which is still built on TSMC’s 0.13-micron manufacturing process with low-k dielectric and copper interconnects, only it has been respun for higher clock speeds. To improve power consumption, R480 incorporates much of the same dynamic clock gating technology that is found in ATI’s mobile graphics products. If you recall, this allows ATI to turn off portions of the chip that aren’t being used, say for instance when you’re running 2D applications such as reading this webpage. This addition significantly reduces thermal output.

The downside

Retail availability problems plagued ATI on the high-end for most of 2004, and these products were no exception: none of the five products ATI announced on December 1st hit the retail market in time for Christmas; instead the first cards went to system builders such as Dell. Some even speculated that ATI deliberately pre-announced the cards to hurt NVIDIA’s holiday sales.

The AGP X850 XT PE (top) poses with the PCI-E X850 XT PE (bottom)

X850 XT PE AGP and PowerColor X800 XL AGP

Another shortcoming of both R430 and R480 was their interface: both cards only supported PCI Express. With millions of existing AGP systems on the market, ATI was essentially ignoring this segment.

Dual DVI on the PCI-E card (right) and DVI/VGA on the AGP (left)

Another shot of the 6800 GT and X850 XT PE AGP

Until now that is…