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| ATI Introduces FireGL™ V7350, the Workstation Industry's First One Gigabyte Graphics Accelerator |
ATI captures the performance crown(1) with an ultra high-end 3D card designed for CAD, DCC and imaging professionals who work with massive datasets MARKHAM, Ontario--(BUSINESS WIRE)--March 20, 2006-- ATI Technologies Inc. (TSX:ATY)(NASDAQ:ATYT) today announced the industry's first one gigabyte (1GB) workstation graphics accelerator, the ATI FireGL™ V7350, and also a 512 megabyte configuration, the FireGL™ V7300. Featuring an extremely powerful ultra-threaded parallel processing GPU, and ATI's industry leading Avivo™ video and display technology, these new ultra high-end graphics cards further extend ATI's workstation graphics line, delivering better performance, more advanced features and higher image quality. ATI's Avivo video and display platform brings an increased level of visual fidelity to the professional graphics market with features such as automatic gain control, gamma correction and increased color bit depth. With a 10-bit per RGB component graphics pipeline, instead of the standard 8-bit, the FireGL's color palette increases to over a billion colors. The result is a finer level of detail throughout the visible spectrum, enhancing details in shadows and making highlights come to life. In addition, high-end displays supporting 16-bit per RGB color component can be fully utilized by the FireGL V7350 and FireGL V7300. Two dual-link connectors also give end users the ability to drive multiple ultra-high resolution displays, yielding a massive desktop display over 5,000 pixels wide. Based on a cutting-edge 90 nanometer process technology and a 512-bit ring bus memory architecture, the FireGL V7350 and FireGL V7300 are able to take advantage of higher speed memories and support 1GB and 512MB frame buffers respectively. The high clock rates of these new graphics cards, combined with full 128-bit precision and extremely high levels of parallel processing, result in floating point processing power that exceeds a 3GHz Pentium processor by a staggering seven times. "ATI's new ultra high-end workstation graphics accelerators leverage our best technology while focusing on the unique features of the workstation market. ATI has coupled increased visual fidelity with the power to drive extremely large data sets with the release of the workstation industry's first 1GB board," said Dinesh Sharma, Director, Workstation Products, ATI. "Just as we have captured leadership market share in the entry-level segment by targeted the specific needs of those customers, ATI has designed its ultra-high end boards to set the standard for the high-end of the market." "ATI has made tremendous strides in their market position over the last year and they've done that by zeroing in on features and pricing that resonate with professional users," said Dr. Jon Peddie, President of Jon Peddie Research, the leading workstation market research firm, located in Tiburon, CA. "This latest foray into the ultra high-end segment market gives ATI a complete top to bottom offering and will solidify their position as a leader in workstation graphics." "At Autodesk, we're continually striving to meet the needs of our customers, who are being challenged to handle increasingly large and complex scenes. Alongside the tools and architecture that we provide in Autodesk Maya software, our users require graphics hardware that can give them the power to drive these sophisticated and intricate data sets that are becoming the staples of their day-to-day work. The FireGL V7350 has all that and more," said Jill Ramsay, Senior Product Manager for Autodesk Maya Software. "With support of the 64-bit OS and now its new Avivo technology, ATI is an important partner that understands the direction that we want to take the industry in and is delivering the kind of experience professional users demand." "The FireGL V7300 and FireGL V7350 are a perfect fit with Alienware - our customers expect the latest and greatest in cutting technology when they purchase one of our systems," said Patrick Cooper, Director of Product Management of Worldwide Product Group for Alienware. "But it isn't just the incredible 1GB frame buffer that caught our attention; it is the multitude of features that allow us to addresses the needs of everyone from the CAD to the DCC customer, that make this a robust solution that checks off everything on our wish list." "Stability, reliability, performance and visual quality is why we have gone with ATI's FireGL graphics accelerators in the past for our workstations - the new FireGL V7350 and FireGL V7300 have maintained this solid tradition but taken each one of these features to a new level," said Tim Lawrence, Vice President of Engineering, Boxx. "Customers will be able to purchase Boxx systems with FireGL graphics because of the impressive performance that 1GB of memory will give them at no sacrifice to image quality." ATI's FireGL products are supported by a unified driver, which is tested and certified by professional 3D ISV partners, making system administration and upgrades cost effective and simple. All FireGL products come with a three year warranty and direct access to a dedicated workstation technical support team. The FireGL V7350 and FireGL V7300 are shipping today from Workstation System Integrators - Alienware, Amax, Boxx, Colfax, Monarch Computer Systems, Omnitech, Polywell, Safe Harbor, Systemax, Polywell, Velocity Micro, Voodoo PC, Xi Computer and 3dshop.com - from distributors - Althon Micro, Armari, Cad2, D&H, Exxact, Ingram Micro, JB&A, Leading Technology, Noesse Daten Technik GmbH, Synnex, Tech Data and Xworks Interactive - and Value Added Resellers at $1,999 USD MSRP and $1,599 USD MSRP respectively. For more information about ATI's FireGL product line, visit www.ati.com/FireGL. About ATI Technologies ATI Technologies Inc. is a world leader in the design and manufacture of innovative 3D graphics, PC platform technologies and digital media silicon solutions. An industry pioneer since 1985, ATI is the world's foremost graphics processor unit (GPU) provider and is dedicated to deliver leading-edge performance solutions for the full range of PC and Mac desktop and notebook platforms, workstation, set-top and digital television, game console and handheld device markets. With fiscal 2005 revenues of US $2.22 billion, ATI has more than 3,400 employees in the Americas, Europe and Asia. ATI common shares trade on NASDAQ (ATYT) and the Toronto Stock Exchange (ATY). Important Information Regarding Forward-looking Statements Certain statements in this news release, including but not limited to the performance of the Avivo Video Converter and the increasing popularity of portable video players, may be considered "forward-looking". Such forward-looking statements are based on current expectations, including the expected rate of growth of the PC and Consumer markets, our overall competitive position and the competitiveness of our products, and, accordingly, entail various risks and uncertainties. Risks that could cause actual results to differ materially from such forward-looking statements include potential software or hardware-related issues or conflicts, the impact of new products or technologies, and consumer demand for portable video players. We therefore cannot provide any assurance that such forward-looking statements will materialize. We assume no obligation to update or revise any forward-looking statement, whether as a result of new information, future events or any other reason. Additional information concerning risks and uncertainties affecting our business and other factors that could cause actual results to differ materially from any forward-looking statement is contained in our filings with Canadian and U.S. securities regulatory authorities, including our 2005 Annual Information Form and 2005 Annual Report filed on SEDAR at www.sedar.com. Our Form 40-F and other filings we make with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission are available on EDGAR at http://www.sec.gov/. (1) The FireGL V7350 is the fastest commercial workstation graphics accelerator currently available. In tests run on a 3.8GHz Pentium 4 processor with 2GB of DDR2 memory, Windows XP and an Intel 925 XCV chipset, the FireGL V7350 received a combined SpecAPC geometric mean score of 3.255. This was the highest geometric mean score for a commercial workstation product. The nearest combined SpecAPC geometric mean score for a competing product was 3.031. Copyright 2006 ATI Technologies Inc. All rights reserved. ATI and ATI product and product feature names are trademarks and/or registered trademarks of ATI Technologies Inc. All other company and product names are trademarks and/or registered trademarks of their respective owners. Features, pricing, availability and specifications are subject to change without notice. For media or industry analyst support, visit our Web site at http://www.ati.com ATI Technologies Inc. (TSX:ATY) (NASDAQ:ATYT)
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| "Safe Harbor" Statement under the Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995: Statements in this press release regarding ATI Technologies's business which are not historical facts are "forward-looking statements" that involve risks and uncertainties. For a discussion of such risks and uncertainties, which could cause actual results to differ from those contained in the forward-looking statements, see "Risk Factors" in the Company's Annual Report or Form 10-K for the most recently ended fiscal year. |