[Vitruvius]

Well maybe issues... not sure. The Apple site specs state that my machine should ship with the following video card:

ATI Radeon 9650 with 256MB DDR SDRAM, one single-link and one dual-link DVI port

But having unpacked the thing and fired up System Profiler, I get this reported:

ATI Radeon 9600: Chipset Model: ATY,RV351 Type: Display Bus: AGP Slot: SLOT-1 VRAM (Total): 256 MB Vendor: ATI (0x1002) Device ID: 0x4150 Revision ID: 0x0000 ROM Revision: 113-A58503-114

Note that the VRAM appears to be the right amount. Just that the model appears to be wrong. There is nothing on the ATI website about a 9650 - so I'm wondering if OS X is just misreporting it - or if I got the wrong card...

I have contacted Apple - who were not very helpful.

Anyone got any ideas?

SH

[The Return of the 'nut]

9650 is just marketing fluff

you have the right card. system profiler probably just doesn't know apple markets it as different when its really not much different at all

[Luca]

Yeah, you should feel lucky it's listed as a 9600 at all. System Profiler used to use internal ATI names like "ATY Rage M6" (or M7, don't remember) for the Mobility Radeon 7500. People who didn't know any better thought they were getting a Rage GPU when it fact they had a Radeon.

So yeah, "9650" is just the Apple name for a 9600 XT with dual-link DVI.

[Vitruvius]

Thank you for the confirmation - I'm glad I'm just the victim of a little Apple marketing rather than getting the wrong card...

Check this link out, sounds like your better off.
http://everythingapple.blogspot.com/

[DMBand0026]

Originally Posted by Vitruvius Thank you for the confirmation - I'm glad I'm just the victim of a little Apple marketing rather than getting the wrong card...

Hhahaha, he said Apple Marketing. I wasn't aware that it existed in the wild.

[darshu]

Originally Posted by Luca Yeah, you should feel lucky it's listed as a 9600 at all. System Profiler used to use internal ATI names like "ATY Rage M6" (or M7, don't remember) for the Mobility Radeon 7500. People who didn't know any better thought they were getting a Rage GPU when it fact they had a Radeon. So yeah, "9650" is just the Apple name for a 9600 XT with dual-link DVI.

A RV350 == Radeon 9600. Pro, XT, etc. are just different designations for different clockspeeds and/or board configurations. This being designated an RV351 is actually a different GPU from the 9600, the differences are probably minor, but it is different.

(Also R300 == Radeon 9700 and R350 == Radeon 9800)

Oh and M6 == Mobility Radeon == M6 (It was called M6 in some marketing literature). M7 == Mobility Radeon 7500.

[Luca]

Interesting observation! I assumed that since Apple listed the same fill rate (1.6 Gpx/s) for both the 9600XT and the 9650 that they were the same card. But look at what a quick Google search for "RV351" turned up:

http://www.theinquirer.net/?article=19046

ATI STILL HAS to launch its response to NV44 AGP. NV 44 AGP is bridged version of Nvidias NV44 a native PCIe card. It will be launched in Q4 2004. ATI's RV351 is its last AGP chip and from RV351 on ATI will bridge its PCI-E with RIALTO bridge chip as long there is a demand for AGP cards. RV351 is meant to replace and update Radeon 9200 cards and will be a direct representative of X300 PCIe cards in AGP market. It's like KY's representative on earth. I expect it to have four pipelines and two vertex Shader units to work with 128 bit DDR 1 memory and to be clocked at close to 300/400 MHz. As always it's possible to expect LE version that will possibly be crippled to use 64 bit memory. The card is supposed to be positioned in the sub $100 market. We expect to see this card in Q4 while it will have just introduced NV43-V, Geforce 6200 and later NV44 chips from Nvidia as direct competitors. We are told that RIALTO is a bridge in Venice. And we thought it was poxy coffee bar in the 60s where you could pick up mod chicks and place them on the back of your Vespa. Bridge name for bridge, get it?

So basically it's a bridged Radeon X300, with the same core clock speed and number of rendering pipelines as the Mac 9600XT (which itself is clocked the same as a PC 9600 Pro). Interesting. This might be a sign of PCI-Express video cards in the next revision... X300 on the low end, X700 on the high perhaps?