ATI's Prasad Sristi

Driverheaven: Hi Prasad, thanks for taking the time to talk to us, how long have you been with ATI and can you tell our readers the companies you worked with before ATI?

Prasad: Allan, it's great to be talking to you. I've been with ATI for an year now - the fun seems to have just started. Before ATI, I've worked in various companies in various fields - from software to microchips . My last stint was at PMC-Sierra, a seminconductor company in Vancouver, managing their highspeed DSL chips. I was there for more than 5 years. Before that I was in Citibank software.

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Driverheaven: The X1600 had a lukewarm welcome, with many criticising ATI for making a product hindered by its 128bit memory interface. How do you respond to that? Do you feel, in retrospect, that you made all the right design decisions concerning the card?

Prasad: Out of the gate, the main complaint wasn't about the features or bandwidth but the price. It's simple psychology - you expect more out of a product if the price tag looks bigger. The X1600 XT was being evaluated as a $249 product, which was the MSRP. The street price was expected to be $179 at launch. Today you can buy the X1600 XT for $149. If I give the X1600 XT now to a gamer and told him it's an ATI graphics product available for $149, he'd be thrilled with the performance.

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Driverheaven: If there was one thing you could have changed about the card before launch, what would it have been?

Prasad: The launch was great - it would have been better if we got the street price message across. But I'm impressed that the press really noticed when we pointed out the street price in the weeks after launch and looked at the X1600 differently.

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Driverheaven: When it was launched the X1600 was up against the 6800GS, how do you feel ATI faired in that comparison?

Prasad: This was definitely an apples to oranges comparison. You can't compare MSRP with street price and put two products together. The surprising thing was that the X1600 XT came out fairly well even with a comparison that put us at a significant price disadvantage.

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Driverheaven: X1600 and Crossfire. How important do you feel the new Radeon Xpress 3200 motherboards are in revealing the X1600CF's true potential?

Prasad: The Xpress 3200 motherboard is state of the art. It's an enthusiast's dream come true. Running two X1600 in crossfire mode on X3200 is like taking your Ferrari out for a spin on the autobahn.

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Driverheaven: How come there is no X1600 XT AGP part? Is this an ATI decision, or is it up to the AIB partners?

Prasad: This is really the AiB partners call. They definitely have the capability to come out with the such a configuration if sufficient demand exists. There was a lot of demand for the X1600 PRO AGP part so we helped the partners come out with the product.

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Driverheaven: When the card first launched last year, many complained about the cooling solution being louder than it should be. Is this addressed with the current batch of cards released to the market, or you feel the said complaints have no merit?

Prasad: Yes, some of the initial samples were sent out without fan-control. The fan never revved down from the initial boot up speed, which we all know is set to maximum. It was a simple matter of updating them with the latest VBIOS. The X1600 XT and PRO now are very quiet. There are also the 0dB passively cooled cards from partners like ASUS.

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Driverheaven: Do you feel that the X1600 CF platform still has room for further performance enhancements? How big a role do you feel forthcoming drivers will have? Any driver potential for performance gains?

Prasad: Terry's team is always looking for improvements. I can't of course reveal our upcoming enhancements but we have a world class team of performance engineers poking the X1600 for performance gains. This is an ongoing process at ATI and as you know, the gaming community likes this approach.

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Driverheaven: How does the latest GF7600 series stack up against the X1600 series?

Prasad: nVidia introduced the GF7600 GS at the same price range as X1600 XT. The X1600 XT performs better in Quake 4, HL2, Fear, Far Cry, Doom 3, COD2 and almost any other popular game. We have a clear winner here in the sub $150 segment with the X1600 XT.

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Driverheaven: What spec of computer system(s) do you have at home, are you a true geek?

Prasad: I have a pentium 4 3.8 GHz, 1 GB RAM and an overclocked X1600 XT. A true geek would build his own rig - haven't had the time to do that yet so I guess I'm not one :)

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Driverheaven: Do you game much? what are your favourite games ? What do you think of the Xbox 360?

Prasad: With my current schedule, I game about 4-6 hours a week. Used to do a lot more in the original university "Doom" days. My favorite games are COD2 and Splinter Cell. The Xbox 360 is a cool piece of equipment - I don't own one yet but I've test driven it. The image quality is outstanding with HDR+AA.

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Driverheaven: What's next?

Prasad: Wait and see. ATI’s architectural approach of having more math instructions to texture instructions per clock has proved to be wildly successful with the X1900. We’ll continue to be have stellar products for the desktop into the future.