DirectX 11 Compatible GPUs from ATI Expected in 2009

Advanced Micro Devices graphics products group ATI announced at the CEATEC trade-show taking place in Japan that it expects to have DirectX 11-compatible GPUs available in 2009. Some voices on the Web say that this is a clear sign that the Sunnyvale company plans to release a new series of graphics cards, one that will fully support the fresh application programming interface. According to the manufacturer, general purpose computing on GPU (GPGPU) is also expected to prosper in the near future.

At the trade-show, the graphics chip manufacturer presented some of its expectations concerning the consumer 3D graphics industry during next year. According to the company, the GPU manufacturing will move to the 40-nanometer process technology, while the GDDR5 memory standard will widely spread. This way, the performance of graphics processing units will be considerably leveraged, and video game developers will be able to develop more sophisticated effects for their products.

According to ATI, GPGPU will rise courtesy of computing shaders of DirectX 11 and OpenCL (Open Computing Language). The company also said that consumer applications that benefit from GPGPU are also expected, and that the importance of graphics processors would rise among end-users. The role of the GPU will be emphasized by the arrival of DirectX 11 and Windows 7 as well.

Advances in input and output technologies are among the company's expectations for the next year. As the company predicted, 2009 should bring towards consumers television sets with higher than 1920x1080 resolution as well as the so called digital walls. The arrival of Microsoft Surface-based devices will allow for the evolution of multi-touch and other input technologies. Also, the popularity of 3D stereoscopic displays is expected to grow through 2009.

Today, both 3D stereographic technology and holograms are considered important things that are already advancing. "Holographic technology is evolving; it can convert virtually everything into visuals. I may not come to CEATEC 2018, but 3D hologram of me will be here. We at AMD would like to keep pursuing the ultimate visual experience," said Rick Bergman, general manager of AMD graphics product group.