µATX Part 1: ATI Radeon Xpress 1250 Performance Review

Final Words

ATI (err... AMD) has produced a very good integrated graphics platform with the Radeon Xpress 1250 chipset. There is no doubt that this platform was their first real shot at exceeding Intel's current offerings in both features and performance. Unfortunately for the consumers this will also be the last Intel platform chipset from ATI, now AMD. This basically leaves AMD competing with NVIDIA, VIA, and SIS for chipsets that support their processor family.

Considering the IGP market accounts for almost 90% of PC shipments, it becomes very obvious that AMD had better hurry to market with a processor and chipset combination that can effectively compete with Intel. Currently, AMD is competing against Intel in this market sector with extremely aggressive pricing on the Athlon 64 X2 series and the cousin to this chipset, the AMD 690G. However, NVIDIA remains the heavy weight champion in the AMD chipset business and is looking towards a piece of the Intel IGP pie with the upcoming MCP73.

The Radeon Xpress 1250 features low power consumption, class leading X1250 graphics performance in Vista with the AVIVO video processing engine, HDMI 1.2 output with full HDCP 1.1 support, 1080p playback capability, and very competitive platform performance all wrapped in a $115 price tag. It seems to us the X1250 was destined to find a home in an inexpensive home theater system or for those owners needing a mainstream system with very good multimedia capabilities.

While we were generally impressed with this release there are also some concerns. The performance of the X1250 graphics core was certainly class leading but one look at the competition tells an ugly truth for many users. Despite being faster than the Intel G33 in most games, it is still underpowered for recent titles - unless you consider 800x600 gaming to be a pleasurable experience. However, the platform is still capable of providing a decent gaming experience in several titles targeting the casual gaming crowd.

Also, the chipset is quickly showing its age as it does not officially support the new 1333MHz FSB capable processors from Intel, even if ASRock is supporting these processors by automatically overclocking the FSB to 333MHz. We did not have any issues during our testing with the E6550 and QX6850 processors, but there is no headroom above 333 if you have overclocking in mind.


As for the boards based upon this chipset, we kept thinking a melding of the two boards from abit and ASRock would have yielded a near perfect competitor to the Intel G965 and to some degree the G33 chipset. abit clearly has an attractive design and features such as four fan headers along with software application control and monitoring, optical out capabilities, HDMI output, and certain BIOS options like the ability to change the CPU multiplier and voltages. ASRock on the other hand provides the ability to overclock the memory, quasi 1333FSB support, additional memory timing adjustments, PCI and PCI Express bus speed settings, DVI output, and Firewire 400 along with better support in our opinion.

Overall, our two Radeon Xpress 1250 boards performed admirably against the Intel G33 with the ASRock board clearly being a better performer than the abit board in almost all areas. The only exceptions are overclocking and overall design aesthetics. We were initially turned off by the abit board due to quality concerns but those appear to have been solved now; however, continued support is still an issue for us. ASRock appears to have support nailed down for now but supply of the board into several markets is still undecided. We expect this board will be available in most areas shortly. Based on their designs and features, we cannot help but think the abit board belongs in an inexpensive HTPC setup and the ASRock board is really designed more for the general desktop user who still needs good multimedia capabilities. We will publish a compatibility report shortly on the motherboards we are reviewing.

At this time, the abit board does not support the 1333MHz FSB processors at a native 333FSB. These CPUs will boot but remain at 266FSB and even trying to overclock the FSB manually to 333 results in numerous black screens or instability during testing. Our newly arrived Blu-ray drive from Pioneer would not work in the abit board. The SB600 equipped boards need a BIOS update for compatibility and abit has yet to provide one or even answer our requests. Also, we had a problem with a PCI based Firewire 400 card not working correctly, though it appears after a driver update this problem has resolved itself.

These particular problems do not exist with the ASRock board, but it has its own set of problems with the current 1.30C or 1.39 BIOS as neither BIOS has worked for us when trying to overclock. ASRock just sent us the new 1.60 BIOS and we will test it shortly and update this article if required. Overall, both boards handled the various memory modules, video cards, input devices, optical drives, USB peripherals, processors, and cooling solutions we tried without an issue.

The real problem we have with the Radeon Xpress 1250 is that it is the end of the line for Intel compatible IGP chipsets from AMD/ATI. While abit and ASRock have committed resources to support their respective boards and current drivers from AMD have progressively improved performance, this chipset family is going nowhere fast. We find that to be disappointing as it deserves a better chance in the market than it will get, but such is the life of an orphan.