16. Conclusion: Late Start With Highlights - And A Little Room For Improvement

Although the Mobility Radeon 9600 came late to the game, it has to be said that it is no doubt a very potent chip. Despite being paired with a much slower CPU (Athlon XP-M 2500+/ 1.86 GHz vs. P4 2.4 GHz), the Mobility Radeon 9600 was able to beat NVIDIA's flagship mobile chip in several benchmarks - sometimes more and sometimes less clearly (see also: DirectX 9 To Go, Part I: Toshiba Satellite 5205-S705 with nVIDIA's GeForce FX Go 5600 ).

Nonetheless, this result should be viewed with a certain amount of caution. After all, Toshiba has not yet commented on the actual clock speed of the GeForce FX Go 5600 in the Satellite 5205-S705.

Thus, the question of which of the two chips is the faster one remains unanswered. If the scores in this review are any indication, though, chances are it's the Mobility Radeon 9600.

But no matter what results the comparison with its direct competitor may yield, the RM9600 is definitely a serious opponent for NVIDIA. This chip allows fluid gaming at acceptable frame rates even with 4x FSAA enabled - at resolutions beyond XGA! On top of that, ATi has proven that graphics core frequencies in excess of 300 MHz (core 300 MHz/ memory 229 MHz) can be achieved, given the right cooling solution - and with a little effort.

The proof: the MR9600 runs at a core speed of more than 300 MHz.

Another point in favor of the ATi chip is the fact that, during our entire testing routine, the driver never once caused us any grief - no lock-ups, no crashes. That's more than can be said for its rival (see Quake 3 , Splintercell ).

But notebooks are not primarily meant for gaming. What's more important for a mobile device are the graphics chip's power saving features and their implementation. ATi has done a good job here, as the battery life of our review sample proves. On the other hand, some of the user interfaces and options are, at least at this point, still facades - which is not only an embarrassing state of affairs for ATi, but also very exasperating for the buyer. While this may be remedied in the future, there doesn't seem to be a solution at the moment.

Targa makes a very compelling point with its Visionary XP10, though: notebooks with integrated high-performance 3D chips don't have to kill your budget. In the case of this notebook, a ticket for the mobile high-performance 3D train costs a rather moderate €1200 (excluding tax).

In case you're wondering whether you should head off to your computer dealer to buy a new laptop with a mobility Radeon 9600 because your "old" notebook with a Mobilty Radeon 9000 has become obsolete - relax. Granted, the new chip runs games much faster than its predecessor, but this doesn't necessarily justify an upgrade. That is, of course, unless you're planning to use it primarily for gaming...

To gaming enthusiasts looking to replace their desktop system with a portable, we offer the following suggestion: hold tight for a few more weeks. By that time, the Mobility Radeon 9600 with 128 MB video memory should be available. More video memory means better frame rates at higher resolutions with FSAA enabled. We'll see...