AMD debuts new integrated graphics chipsets

SAN FRANCISCO/HANOVER (Reuters) - Advanced Micro Devices Inc (AMD.N) announced a new collection of chips that will add better graphics capabilities to the motherboards that connect the different parts of a personal computer.

AMD's new graphics processing units, called the AMD 780 series, are aimed at capturing a bigger piece of the integrated graphics chipset market by offering a big boosts in gaming and high definition video playback in mainstream personal computers at reasonable prices.

Such performance was previously available by slotting in dedicated graphic boards into the motherboard, which usually includes integrated graphics that are not aimed at high-end graphics users.

The AMD 780 series of graphics chips can be paired by AMD's dual- and quad-core processors on motherboards made by manufacturers such as Asus and Gigabyte.

AMD expects the motherboards using the AMD chipsets to cost about $80 to $120, less than motherboards using integrated graphics from rival Intel Corp (INTC.O).

PCs using the AMD 780 series chipsets are expected to be available starting in the second quarter of this year, AMD said.

The company detailed the chipset at CeBIT, Europe's biggest information technology fair.

Separately, AMD also said it was on track with its 45-nanometer chipmaking process technology and that chips made using the technology will be in volume production in the second half of this year.

Bill En, an AMD manager in Sunnyvale, California, where AMD is based, said samples of its 45 nanometer products were available today.

"Intel is certainly earlier than us relative to the 45-nanometer product, but we're keeping things within a year in terms of our launch target, and we really feel that it will keep us competitive," En said.

Intel is already making chips with its 45-nanometer process technology.

(Reporting by Duncan Martell in San Francisco and Georgina Prodhan in Hanover, editing by Will Waterman)