While the FireGL V3600 will probably do little to excite the power hungry digital artists, it will certainly get the attention of the CAD sector. It will be a little longer before we see the V8600 (1GB) and FireGL V8650 (2GB). The first card to ship will be the FireGL V3600, closely followed by the V5600 and V7600. In addition to the new cards, AEC understands that ATI will keep the R500-based FireGL V3350 in its range, to fulfill the role of a true budget entry-level workstation card. Support for Stereo 3D, however, is still the reserve of the high-end (V7600 and above) and if you are looking to run powerwalls with Framelock you will have to invest in a V8600 or V8650. Interestingly, all cards feature 2 x Dual Link support, so driving two hi-res monitors, such as AppleÝs Cinema display, at resolutions of 2,560 x 1,600 is no problem. After all, it would take a hell of a lot of complex geometry and textures to fill 2GB. A cynic might say this is more about getting one up on arch-rival Nvidia (whose Quadro FX5600 features 1.5GB), than solving real world graphics problems. While ATI has not been shy in dishing out 256MB for its entry-level V3600, it has been downright generous with its top end V8650, which features a whopping 2GB. Technological evolution obviously plays a role in defining the specifications of the new generation cards, but so does Windows Vista, as 128MB of on-board memory is simply not practical for MicrosoftÝs new Operating System.
There are five cards in total: the entry-level FireGL V3600 (256MB), the mid-range FireGL V5600 (512MB), the high-end V7600 (512MB) and the ultra high-end FireGL V8600 (1GB) and FireGL V8650 (2GB). ATI is catering for the entire cross section of professional 3D users with entry-level budget cards for CAD, right up to beasts with 2GB memory for those pushing the limits in the Digital Content Creation (DCC) sector. This year Siggraph took place in San Diego and ATI used it as the springboard for its new generation FireGL graphics cards, based on the companyÝs R600 architecture. Such is the importance of the event that software and hardware developers plan their release schedules around the show – which takes place during the summer months at a different location each year in the US. Siggraph is THE industry Ùget togetherÝ for anyone involved in specialist computer graphics.
ATIÝs FireGL V3600 is the entry-level card in its R600 family, and will feature both a new unified architecture and multithreaded drivers.
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