A web-site has posted a photograph of ATI’s Radeon X1950-series graphics card, which is expected to replace the company’s current Radeon X1900 family at the top of the company’s lineup offering. The new device apparently features a new cooling system, which some sources close to the company said to be quieter compared to that currently shipping.

The picture published by HKEPC shows that the new Radeon X1950 graphics board features much larger copper radiator as well as thermal-tubes compared to the cooler used on the Radeon X1900-series. The blower used on the new add-in card has also been changed to a more advanced one, according to the photograph.

Currently it is unclear whether the new cooling system is tailored for improved cooling capabilities to lower temperatures, designed to reduce the noise levels or a combination of both goals.

The Radeon X1950 was previously known as code-named R580+ product, which will feature the same Radeon X1900 XTX chip with 48 pixel shader processors, but now equipped with GDDR4 memory at higher clock-speeds compared to today’s GDDR3. The GPU’s memory controller will be reprogrammed to handle higher clock-speeds and the whole R580+ design will allow ATI to test the GDDR4 memory ahead of its broad deployment in the next-generations of products.

Currently it is rumoured that the Radeon X1950 XTX will feature 650MHz chip and 2000MHz (2.00GHz) memory, while having official recommended price of below $500.

ATI did not comment on the news-story.