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  • AMD Announces New Graphics Chips
Technology Articles > Hardware > Graphics Cards > AMD Announces New Graphics Chips

This week, almost all graphics chip news has been centered on Intel’s new Ivy Bridge line, but AMD is putting out some new graphics chips too. In fact, AMD has just announced a new line of graphics chips that include the Radeon 7700, 7800, and 7900. In case you’re not familiar with AMD graphics chips, these chips can be found inside of the MacBook Pro and the HP Envy series, which are both high-end systems. Formerly known as ATI, AMD has told press that the new series will be much smoother all-around. Seemingly, AMD is hoping to keep up with Nvidia, which has easily become one of the most recognized brands within the graphic chip world.

Smoother Transitions

For some time now, Nvidia has been working to make graphics transitions much smoother when it comes to alternating between discrete and integrated graphics. Now, AMD has developed the 7700, 7800, and 7900 additions and all of these chips have been developed to live up, and surpass, Nvidia’s transition smoothness. Not only has AMD been working on creating a chip that can effortless switch between integrated and discrete graphics, but the new series has also been built to use much less power. Dubbing the series the “Enduro” series, AMD aims to sell these chips to the power-conscious crowd.

In order to entice those who are looking to save energy, the new AMD Enduro chips include parts that will shut down automatically when not in use. This, in turn, will allow for longer battery life, which is always an important selling point. AMD’s target market are laptop manufacturers who might see a great appeal in purchasing and installing chips that consumer virtually no energy. After all, a laptop that has a long-lasting battery is a laptop that will sell (and that manufacturers such as Apple can attach a much higher price tag too). It’s unlikely that the new AMD chips will be present inside of lower end laptops, but you can expect the MacBook Pro (and competing systems) to include these power-saving chips within the near future.

Stacking Up Specifics

Just how successful will AMD be when competing with the likes of Nvidia? Spec-wise, the new Enduro line has a lot to offer. To prove just how advanced the new Enduro cards are, AMD has released some comparative information. Testing out the new 7970 chip against Nvidia’s GTX 675M (tested on an Intel system), the AMD chip beat Nvidia’s offering in nearly every competition. While the Nvidia card put out 49.5fps when set on High (1920X1200), the 7970 chip gained 70fps. AMD’s card also proved to consume less energy and beat the Nvidia chip in nearly all benchmarks. In addition to testing the 7970 card, AMD has also released some comparative stats concerning the other cards in the Enduro lineup -- all of these cards have tested very well.

Seemingly, AMD has done a good job of proving that the company’s new cards really do outperform other market offerings. AMD has told press that the new cards are set to show up in more than 200 different laptops over the span of the next few weeks, so you’ll want to look for any systems that include AMD’s new Enduro chips.