Sharky Extreme: How important will the ArtX technology and the set top/console market be for ATI's return to profitability?

Dave Orton: The Consumer business is one of the 4 key pillars of ATI's business. These markets will build on ATI's strength in bringing 3D to new heights and will bring both top-line and bottom line growth. Both the set top box and console businesses are critical elements to ATI's 2002 business plan, but the three pillars of our PC business will bring ATI to sustained profitability in Fiscal 2001. These segments include the Desktop, Mobile, and Integrated businesses.

Sharky Extreme: On the PC side of ATI's operations, how were Microsoft's DirectX 8 delays affecting ATI's release schedule? What does this mean for game developers who are looking to optimize for the RADEON?

Dave Orton: While DirectX 8.0 was not released publicly until November, developers have had access to beta versions for months prior to that. Radeon was designed as a DirectX 8.0 accelerator, and since its release in July 2000 ATI has been working closely with game developers to help them take advantage of the latest 3D graphics features. This combination of a great development platform and strong collaboration with game designers resulted in early development of DirectX 8.0 titles that will show up for this Christmas and early in 2001. Things are on track - serious gamers should make sure to have a card, which utilizes DirectX 8.0 so they will be ready for the exciting titles that will be coming out shortly.

Sharky Extreme: HyperZ was a good "first-step" in reducing the limitations imposed by memory bandwidth. Will future ATI products utilize refined implementations of HyperZ?

Dave Orton: Yes, future ATI products will utilize refined technologies to alleviate the limitations imposed by memory bandwidth. ATI recognized that memory bandwidth is of great importance - this was taken into consideration during the design and development phases of the Radeon product. As a result, the Radeon is ahead of its time in terms of tackling this issue. Radeon's implementation of Hyper Z, however, is just a first step in our efforts. The next generations of ATI's Hyper Z technology will add even greater "intelligence" in the way we handle the memory bottleneck issue.

Sharky Extreme: Various ATI roadmaps have popped up on the Net forecasting a RADEON II with "2x RADEON performance" sometime before the year-end. Since this obviously isn't going to happen, when can we expect to see ATI's next generation card?

Dave Orton: ATI is committed to having a product in the performance category. The Radeon was a good first step for ATI to gain a presence there. Since the Radeon, we have doubled our resources in that sector. Expect some incredible products coming from ATI that will make 2001 one of the most exciting years yet for 3D.