AMD Announced ATI Mobility Radeon HD 4000 Series
AMD has announced its brand new graphics platform for notebooks, the ATI Mobility Radeon HD 4000 series. Since I currently have an HD 3000 series which has been working more than fine so far, I’d be quite interested in what the HD 4000 will bring to PC gaming, and particularly to notebook gaming.
The new graphics platform should be twice as fast and it should support GDDR5 RAM and Microsoft DirectX 10.1. An HD 4000 card will encode and decode HD video and it will get that DVD content to 1080p resolution without involving the CPU. Hi-definition audio via HDMI with 7.1 digital surround sound and DisplayPort Audio are other features of the HD 4000. These are going to be the first mobile graphics platform to offer such services.
The new graphics cars are to be expected in Q1 of 2009. You will be able to choose from ATI CrossFireX-capable HD 4800, the HD 4600, the HD 4500 and 4300. The first one will combine two GPUs while the second one is optimized for performance and energy efficiency. The last two will prioritize battery life but they will still get the job done. Expect Asus and MSI laptops to carry the new ATI Mobility Radeon HD 4000, but soon others will follow.