Specifications

One of the key ingredients that encompasses the North Bridge of a system chipset is its memory controller. AMD users saw this firsthand when the first DDR platforms for the Athlon were introduced a few years ago. AMD’s own AMD-760 chipset offered better performance and stability than VIA’s KT266, mainly thanks to its superior memory controller. NVIDIA has enjoyed the same advantage more recently with the dual-channel Twinbank memory architecture found in its nForce2 lineup. In our testing with the ASUS P4R800-V Deluxe, we found the 9100 IGP trailed competing Pentium 4 chipsets from SiS and Intel by as much as 16% in memory bandwidth, hurting overall platform performance.

So when it came time to optimize the performance of the original RADEON 9100 IGP, the first area ATI looked was the chipset’s memory controller.

The controller used on the RADEON 9100 PRO IGP has been optimized for added performance as well as compatibility with a wider range of DDR400 memory modules. ATI found that the original controller had problems with DDR400 modules from lesser known manufacturers than the Crucials, Corsairs, and Kingstons of the memory world. The RADEON 9100 PRO IGP should work just fine with these memory modules (for best performance, we still recommend purchasing a high quality memory module, as often these DIMMs can run at lower timings than more generic modules). Like the original RADEON 9100 IGP, the RADEON 9100 PRO IGP supports up to 4GB of memory, supports Intel’s latest 800MHz processors (as well as previous 533MHz and 400MHz chips) and can operate in single-channel or dual-channel mode.

Finally, ATI has also enhanced the performance of their AGP 8X interface. This should could as welcome news to those of you who would like to pair a RADEON 9100 IGP PRO motherboard with an external graphics card like the RADEON 9800 XT.

The integrated graphics itself remains unchanged, sporting a 2x1 architecture clocked at 300MHz.

On the southern end of the motherboard, ATI has incorporated a brand new South Bridge, IXP 300. ATI’s IXP 300 chip provides native Serial ATA drive support, a key feature that was lacking on previous ATI chipsets. Support for up to two drives is provided natively by the IXP 300 South Bridge. The new South Bridge also provides RAID support. RAID Levels 0 and 1 are available.

The final addition ATI has incorporated into the IXP 300 is in the form of a more robust USB 2.0 controller. While IXP 200 was capable of driving up to six USB 2.0 devices, ATI has increased that figure to eight devices in IXP 300, matching the specifications of Intel’s ICH5 used in 875P/865G.

RADEON 9000 PRO IGP

For entry level value systems, today ATI has introduced the RADEON 9000 PRO IGP. While the name is a little different, the RADEON 9000 PRO IGP is built on the same fundamental architecture as the RADEON 9100 IGP, the chipset supports Intel’s 800MHz system bus as well as the older 533MHz bus just like the original RADEON 9100 IGP. ATI also uses the same integrated graphics core.

The sole change is found in the memory controller. Whereas the 9100 IGP and 9100 PRO IGP support dual-channel operation, the RADEON 9000 PRO IGP possess a single-channel interface. Because of this distinction, this chipset is intended to battle with Intel’s similarly outfitted 848P chipset, which also supports the latest Pentium 4 processors and memory technologies yet relies on a single-channel memory interface.