Mike Silverman, who helps me post my blogs on-line, made a reference to my favorite book last week. I am mentioning this not because he talked about The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy (a career advancing move) but because I thought a recent announcement of ours made his point rather well.
Actually, it is really not the book that I love but rather the original radio series broadcast by the BBC in the late 1970s. There are now in total five Hitchhiker’s series, but in my view only the first two can be considered the original. The last three, while splendidly written by Dirk Maggs for the BBC, where not from the pen of Douglas Adams. Series Two remains my favorite, with the first episode of that series (I believe known as the “Christmas Special”) being the best. You may need to listen to the radio series or read the book to follow my meaning exactly, but if not, don’t panic.
Anyway …
The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy introduced a fictional species called the Babel fish. By inserting a Babel fish into your ear, you can suddenly understand all the languages of the world (and in the case of H2G2, the universe). The Babel fish is the ultimate translation tool – turning nonsense into understandable language. While we don’t have any Babel fishes at AMD, this week we did try to do something Babel fish-like to help turn nonsense into something understandable for PC gamers.
In addition to AMD LIVE!™ for home use, AMD Business Class for work and productivity use, this week we launched AMD GAME! In an effort to help AMD’s customers and the PC Gamers who buy their machines easily find the right gaming solution for themselves. As my last blog pointed out – choice can be a confusing thing. And that’s not your fault.
It is interesting to note that 68% of all video game consoles shipped worldwide in 2008 are expected to contain AMD graphics IP (note 1). With great market share comes great responsibility. Thus the question becomes, how do we work with OEMs and system builders to bring that high definition, console-like experience to the PC gamer?
The purpose of AMD GAME! is to declare a set of configuration types that are appropriate for PC gamers and then highlight the types of systems configurations that would best support them.
When you see the AMD GAME! Logo on a system, you’ll know that the machine has been optimized for gaming, with dual core processing power like the Athlon™ 64 X2 5600+, the ATI Radeon™ HD 3650 graphics card and either an AMD 770 or NV 500 series chipset. If you want more power then you need to go Ultra and that requires a real Quad-core like the Phenom™ X4 9650, an ATI Radeon™ HD3750 graphics card and an AMD 770 chipset. Suggested for both is a minimum of 2GB RAM.
Is there a third level, maybe an ‘ultimate-Ultimate’?
Yes. And it is made for gamers building their own tricked-out rigs. If you want to know more – we have a website for them: http://game.amd.com
Now, GAME! on.
Note 1: Worldwide Videogame Console Hardware and Software 2008–2012 Forecast and Analysis - March 2008
Nigel Dessau is senior vice president and chief marketing officer at AMD. His postings are his own opinions and may not represent AMD's positions, strategies or opinions. Links to third party sites are provided for convenience and unless explicitly stated, AMD is not responsible for the contents of such links sites and no endorsement is implied.