Diamond's Viper X1600 Integrates Extreme Gaming And Digital Lifestyle Features

Viper X1600 Combines Ultra-Threaded 3D Architecture and Super-Fast GPU with Lifelike High-Def Viewing of Movies, Photos & Games

(Chatsworth, CA)-Diamond Multimedia (www.diamondmm.com), a leading manufacturer of PC graphics cards, sound cards and communications products, today announced it has begun shipping the Viper X1600, a state-of-the-art graphics card that offers sharp, vibrant images and the sophisticated ability to connect to a variety of gaming, PC and television platforms using the ATI Radeon X1600 PRO chipset.

The X1600 card is the latest in a series of high-performance graphics cards featuring the powerful ATI Radeon chip. It brings a ruthlessly efficient memory controller, with a 500 MHz core speed, enabling a whole new level of performance and functionality for PC graphics. The superior quality of the X1600 lets gamers worry less about memory usage and effortlessly enjoy better gameplay.

The X1600 is also equipped with ATI's Avivo video and display platform, which enables a High-Definition visual experience, and allows for universal connectivity to various digital devices, including home theater systems, LCD monitors, HDTVs, projectors and notebooks. Digital videos, gaming and photos are enhanced by sharpened images and smoother video playback. Avivo offers sharper display for video and photos compared with conventional cards, as well as "universal display connectivity" - which eliminates the long-standing barrier of being able to display PC graphics on a variety of consumer electronics devices, including big-screen televisions.

The X1600 also boasts CrossFire platform support, in which the gamer can combine multiple graphics cards on one motherboard to speed up gaming with "supertiling," wherein the processing and graphics rendering becomes shared between the two graphics cards.

The Viper X1600 uses the Radeon X1600 PRO GPU, with memory support for up to 512MB in both PCI Express and AGP interface. The connectors included are DVI, VGA, TV-Out/HDTV, and VIVO. Minimum system requirements for the card are an Intel Pentium 4 of AMD Athlon 64 FX CPU running at a minimum of 2.4 GHz, PCIE slot, 64MB system RAM, 200MB available hard disk space, a CD- or DVD-ROM drive, and a 420 Watt power supply or higher. Also needed is a Super VGA or DVI-I compatible monitor. The X1600 will run under Windows XP, Windows 2000 or Windows XP Media Center environments.

The Viper X1600 also comes with extensive software, including the Catalyst Control Center, the award-winning feature-rich 3D software application. Catalyst automatically configures optimal settings for your system, and is packed with features that go far beyond traditional driver configuration software.

All Diamond video cards also carry the Diamond guarantee of quality assurance. Unlike many cards that are simply first to market, Diamond carefully tests and retests every new model for its ratio of performance to reliability. Diamond is legendary in the PC video card business for its low return rates - less than 1 percent versus an industry average of approximately 10 percent - and attributes this to its intensive testing, detailed product knowledge down to the component level, superior relationships with suppliers and unyielding commitment to quality. Diamond cards use superior connectors, cables and components, as well as undergo more thorough testing for heat susceptibility and durability, and this is directly reflected in its superior track record of longevity at the highest levels of performance.

The X1600 PRO will retail at $199 for the 256MB and $249.99 for the 512MB. It is available through most North American distributors, such as Ingram Micro, Tech Data and D&H along with most leading computer retailers and e-commerce sites.