AMD, Nvidia launch rival graphics cards

BEIJING, June 17 (Xinhuanet) -- AMD and Nvidia released next-generation graphics processors Monday as the two chip makers continued to compete on discrete graphics products.

Nvidia's new GeForce GTX 200 series includes the GeForce GTX 280, available in quantity starting Tuesday for a suggested manufacturers' price of 649 U.S. dollars, and the GeForce GTX 260, available June 26 with a price tag of 399 dollars.

The GTX 280, with 240 processors and a full gigabyte of frame buffer memory, is clearly Santa Clara, Calif.-based Nvidia's latest edge-pushing high-end consumer card, while the 192-processor, 896MB GTX 260 has humbler specs, but not by much.

Up the road in Sunnyvale, Calif., AMD's latest pair of consumer cards from its ATI graphics division target a lower portion of the discrete market. The new ATI Radeon HD 4800 series will deliver a teraflop of graphics performance, according to Rick Bergman, GM of AMD's Graphics Products Group.

And the Radeon HD 4850, set for release June 25, will do it for less than 200 dollars, Bergman said. The second card announced Monday is the Radeon HD 4870. It's a bit more powerful and a bit more pricey at around 300 dollars than the 4850, and isn't scheduled for availability until July 8.

Both companies also see scientific and industrial applications for the increased parallel processing powers of their graphics processing units (GPUs).

AMD, Nvidia and Intel Corp, the world's biggest computer chipmaker, now all stress the importance of visual computing: The ability of ever more powerful computer chips to deliver more lifelike video games, reformat home videos for playback on devices like smart phones, manipulate digital content like photographs and play high-def movies.

In games, it seems certain that these newer chips will allow PCs to regain a graphics edge over the fixed-specification next-generation consoles, but proclaiming them as an advance equivalent to the introduction of sound in movies is a little far-fetched.

(Agencies)