ATI, graphics business unit of Advanced Micro Devices, this week launched the world’s first family of DirectX 11 graphics processing units (GPUs) designed for notebooks. The new ATI Mobility Radeon HD 5000-series family code-named Manhattan will bring a plethora of new capabilities to mobile computers as well as increase performance bar for mobile graphics.

“AMD changes the game both in terms of performance and experience. AMD innovations now give notebook users full DirectX 11 support, eye-opening ATI Eyefinity technology, superb HD multimedia capabilities, and ATI Stream technology designed to help optimize Windows 7 notebook performance,” said Rick Bergman, senior vice president and general manager of products group at AMD.

ATI Mobility Radeon HD 5000 family of mobile GPUs not only brings DirectX 11, DirectCompute 11, ATI Eyefinity and other technologies to the rapidly growing market of notebooks, but also enable very low power consumption in idle  mode thanks to 40nm process technology as well as AMD’s proprietary technologies to trim power usage. For example, the new version of Vari-Bright technology used for optimizing notebook display brightness delivers up to 50% power savings over the previous generation’s software based approach.

Even though model numbers of ATI Mobility Radeon HD 5000-series resemble those of desktop graphics chips, specifications of GPUs designed for mobile computers are completely different. For example, the top-of-the-range ATI Mobility Radeon HD 5870 features 800 stream processors, two times lower compared to its desktop counterpart. In addition, the Mobility Radeon HD 5000 line includes a couple of DirectX 10.1 graphics processors based on previous-generation architecture.

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Although ATI unveiled its new family of graphics processors for notebooks at the Consumer Electronics Show, actual systems with DirectX 11-capable ATI Mobility Radeon HD 5000-series graphics are scheduled to be available in the first half of 2010. At present only Asustek Computer, Lenovo Group and MicroStar International indicated plans to integrate the new Mobility Radeon HD 5000 GPUs into their laptops.

Tags: ATI, AMD, Radeon, Mobility Radeon, Evergreen, Manhattan, 40nm