ATI 9100 IGP PRO: Optimized for Prescott

Comparing Integrated Graphics

The integrated graphics of the ATI 9100 IGP PRO remains essentially the same as the graphics released six months ago as the RS300 chipset. The 9100 IGP is still the fastest integrated graphics that you can find for an Intel processor. While it is true that the 9100 IGP PRO is still built on a DirectX 8.1 part, ATI is now emphasizing the fact that the new PRO chipset is designed to work with DirectX 9.0B. This is likely due to the confusion many expressed over a DirectX 8.1 graphics part in the RS300 release.

While DX8.1 may not run DX9 games to their best advantage, the 9100 IGP PRO can definitely run DirectX 9 games with the integrated ATI graphics. While often very slow, there was not a single DX9 game we tested that would not run on the 9100 IGP PRO with DirectX 9.0B installed.

Many also overlook the fact that Intel 865G integrated graphics are based on the even older DirectX 7 standard. Looking at a technology comparison between the RADEON 9100 PRO IGP and the Intel 865G, it is easy to see why the 9100 IGP family should significantly outperform the Intel 865G in almost any graphics testing.

Click to enlarge.

Performance was compared between the integrated Intel Intense Graphics 2 on the Intel 865G and the integrated 9100 IGP of the RS350. In both cases, we used the 2.8E Prescott that performed as well or better than Northwood in our testing on the RS350. Since ATI 9100 IGP PRO is so much faster than Intel 865G graphics, the fact that the 865G may have performed slightly faster with a 2.8C CPU is largely irrelevant, since the impact on our test results would have been minimal, and that difference is lost in the large performance delta between the integrated graphics solutions.