ATI launches mobile PCI Express GPUs for performance and mainstream notebooks

Markham (ON) - In a move to counter Nvidia's GeForce Go 6800, ATI today launched its Mobility Radeon X800 to offer desktop graphics performance for high-end PCI Express notebooks. The manufacturer also introduced the X300, an entry level mobile graphics processor for mainstream and thin & light notebooks.

Both Chips complement the X600 chip, which was announced in June of this year for desktop replacement notebooks (DTR). The firm's new powerhouse X800 pushes the X600 down into the "performance thin" market; the new X300 chip fills the role of the entry-level graphics processor to complete ATI's top-to-bottom series of PCI Express notebook graphics.

The X800 is based on the X600 Pro desktop graphics processor and is equipped with the feature set of the X800 desktop series. The chip offers a core frequency of 400 MHz. Both the X300 and X800 come with twelve pixel pipes and include are a new generation of power management (Powerplay 5.0), support for GDDR3 memory, and a 256-bit memory interface for capacities of up to 256 MByte, as well as several features to enhance visual performance, ATI said.

Tom's Hardware Guide had the opportunity to run the X800 through first benchmarks which revealed that the graphics processor is able to clearly trump Nvidia's GeForce Go 6800 in FarCry disciplines, but was outpaced in the Doom 3 Demo. Most significantly, Nvidia's chip was able to maintain performance lead of about 15 percent in 3DMark2005.

Here are the benchmark results in detail: