SUMMARY: We've been hearing all kinds of good things so far concerning the new ATi Radeon 9700 series graphics cards, but can it possibly live up to all the hype? Come join Tio Chaharbaghi as he takes a look at this beast and tells us once and for all if it has what it takes to become the next champ, or the next chump!
Over the last few years, only one chipmaker has been able to dominate the market with their line of graphic chipsets, nVidia. The closest competitor they had was the Canadian based company ATi. As the GeForce 2 line was rolling out, ATi started getting serious by releasing the Radeon series. The result? The ATi Radeon coming up short.
As the GeForce 3 line started hitting the market, ATi finally released their 8500 line of video cards. The Result? ATi coming up short again. Would a moment come where ATi would have at least a quarter of dominance?
A month and a half ago, ATi finally came to the table with a graphic chipset that would blow the world away. On July 17th 2002, on display in San Francisco, CA, ATi showed off their new Radeon 9700 Pro based on the R300 core.
nVidia releases there GeForce 4 Ti series, ATi releases the 9700/9000 Pro line a while later. The Result? A new king of performance has been crowned. ATi has finally grasped the graphic market by its hand, and won't be letting go for at least 4-6 months. Where is nVidia's answer?
According to various sources, nVidia's "answer" has been delayed until late 4th quarter 2002/1st quarter 2003. These sources state that it seems nVidia is having trouble making the transition to 0.13 micron chips. Note that the 9700 is based on the 0.15 micron and ATi is still trying to squeeze out every MHz until they make their transition to the 0.13 micron chip in early Q1 2003.
Today, in the newly opened Canadian Tweak Town Labs, we will be taking a look at ATi's newest creation; the ATi 9700 Pro. We will take you through information about the card, a technological background and of course benchmarks.
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