ATI sakes a claim in AGP graphics market

Electronic News, Nov 10, 1997

Toronto--ATI Technologies will today roll out a graphics accelerator that it says will be the industry's first to fully implement the emerging AGP (advanced graphics port) technology first advanced by Intel.

Dubbed the 3D Rage LT Pro, the device is targeted at the mainstream mobile notebook and flat panel display (FPD) desktop markets, and will offer compatibility with both the mobile Accelerated Graphics Port (AGP) 1X and 2X modes, as well as hardware acceleration for software DVD and tri-view triple display output.

Geoff Ballew, analyst at San Jose, Calif.-based market research firm Dataquest, said tri-view is just a marketing ploy against market-leader S3. However, dual-view technology, or the ability to project two different sets of information on two different screens such as an LCD and CRT monitor, is becoming extremely important. Both ATI and S3 feature this dual-view with ATI claiming it can also do tri-view monitoring. Tri-view enables a user to project three different sets of information on three different screens whether it be a liquid crystal display (LCD), CRT monitor or TV.

"This is a strong product from the performance side--2-D, 3-D, the whole bit--and (ATI) is the only company shipping a 133MHz AGP solution today," said Mr. Ballew. "ATI is having tremendous success on the desktop side and this seems to be a real strong chip targeted at the volume notebook sweet spot." The 3D Rage LT Pro is currently sampling priced at $35 in 10,000-unit quantities.

The tri-view triple display features two palettes, two independent CRT controllers, VGA and video overlay support, two DA converters and an integrated enhanced Impact TV2.

ATI is currently developing plans to roll out a graphics accelerator with embedded DRAM for the mobile market but nothing has been finalized. Azzedine Boubguira, product marketing manager for ATI, hinted that this would be a true 3-D engine--like the S3 Virge/MXi (EN, Oct. 20)--unlike many of the 2-D engines with some 3-D characteristics. No time-line has been set for when ATI's device might be available.

Some 'Firsts'

In addition to laying claim to AGP leadership, the company will claim the 3D Rage LT Pro is the first with hardware acceleration for software DVD and the first company to add tri-view triple display to its chip. However, some industry observers say they believe most of these features will not be available until 2H98, thereby delaying the availability of these features during what could be a critical design-in window.

"Most system vendors do not design new systems for nine to 10 months down the road. AGP, DVD and tri-view will all be ready by that time so we are rolling this out so vendors can plan and design ahead," responded Mr. Boubguira. "In the meantime, for those notebook applications currently available, the LT Pro is offered in a PCI or AGP version that will certainly enhance 3-D graphics in any notebook."

According to Phoenix, Ariz.-based Semico Research, DVD-ROMs for notebooks should start arriving by the end of 1998 and the company forecasts unit shipment growth will grow to around 10 million DVD-ROM drives in notebooks by the year 2001.

Around that same time--driven partially by DVD-ROM sales--AGP should start to be a force to be reckoned with, according to Michael Bernstein, senior consultant with Semico. "This will help laptops at the high-end because people are making multimedia presentations and can couple this with DVD video clips. We could also see... DVD-RAM showing up and replacing all of the CD-ROMs."

Mr. Bernstein postulated that the FPD desktop market is going to be initially a niche market but as the price goes down and need arises, demand may take off.

"These FPD desktops won't be going to Joe Sixpack consumer who would put one in his living room or family room but more in an office type environment," he said. "If we see companies producing FPDs at the 40- and 42-inch levels priced around $1,500 then we will see the market take off."

ATI's Mr. Boubguira said the company is beginning to talk with FPD desktop OEMs and mobile OEMs regarding integrating the 3D Rage LT Pro into future systems. The device incorporates complete 3-D features including new functions such as edge anti-aliasing, single pass bilinear/trilinear filtering, VQ texture compression, texture compositing, specular highlights, shadows and spotlights, and floating-point setup engines. Along with the 3-D features, the chip integrates 2-D graphics and ratiometric expansion to scale to the active display area of an LCD.