3D Accelerators

While Nvidia and 3Dfx were fighting it out for the fasted most feature packed graphics card on the market, ATI was controlling the market for high quality cards that utilised the TV in and out and DVD decoding as well as good cards for video editing. This was the area that ATI was famed for. The company had never really delved into the fast paced 3D market. Its all- in-wonder products was selling well. Its previous attempts at the 3D market never really made a significant impact. The Rage series of products including the Rage Fury and the Rage Fury MAXX didn't really hit 3Dfx or Nvidia hard. ATI went quiet then in the 3D market especially after reviews of the rage fury MAXX showed that even though it had a two processor system, they didn't give twice the performance of the single processor version and really wasn't a contender in the market when it should of been. The MAXX came with 64Mb of RAM the first video card ever to do this. 

Just when it looked so bleak in the 3D market for ATI, they came back with a knockout blow. Where this card come from I don't know, there was no build up to it, ATI just sprung it on us from nowhere. This card was of course the Radeon. the Radeon was a great card from ATI, it was sure to steal some of the limelight from the other 2 major card makers. With the knowledge that ATI already had about the TV cards that they already make as well as quality DVD decoding, they were able to integrate all this into a great card. At the time of release they had the most support for DirectX 8.0, they say they had more supported features of this release of DirectX than any other card on the market. It came with a choice of 32Mb and 54Mb of DDR RAM with the latter being a little more expensive than the former. Back in the race for the best 3D card on the market ATI started to make a range of Radeon cards.

The power or high-end card from ATI was the Radeon 8500 retail version. This card was meant for the serious power user, it should be faster than most cards out although it did have driver problems which left the card behind on all the benchmarks when it was released. If you have this card I recommend that you keep checking ATI's website for updated drivers you can check for 8500 drivers here and the 7500 here.

Continuing the the trend for All-In-Wonder cards ATI produced the All-In-Wonder Radeon. The All-In-Wonder Radeon come with the Radeon graphics chipset and added features such as TV on demand, the ability to pause live TV. watch full screen DVD's without a hardware decoder. connect to your TV or video, and create your own home movies. Plus watch TV on your PC turn your PC into a full TV. Watch your favourite programs in a window while you work or browse the internet. Or watch full screen TV. This card is a good choice for anyone who wants to do it all. If you want speedy 3D games, DVD decoding TV and video editing plus you want to watch your favourite programs on your TV then this has to be the card for you. Its the most complete card I have ever seen along with being one of the fastest cards around as well! This card was then evolved into the All in Wonder Radeon 8500. Slightly clocked down from the original 8500 but has the features of that as well as the TV and DVD capabilities.

To keep up with the like's of Nvidia ATI had to bring out a budget style card that could keep up with the like of the Geforce 2 MX, something around the £100 mark that many people who could afford the monster cards could still buy. ATI did this buy producing the Radeon with 32Mb of SDR (Single Data Rate) memory. As this type of memory is a lot cheaper to get hold of the price was considerably cheaper and ATI had a competitive card everywhere in the market now. If you previously thought that the Geforce 2 MX was your type of card then this is in the same league. You may want to study the two closely to see which will be better for you. You may also find that you budget stretches up to the 7500 which is getting cheaper all the time as the 8500 comes to the shelves.

Next - Summery - Top of the range cards

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