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The RADEON XPRESS 200 series is a dual-chip core logic solution, sporting a number of modern features, such as PCI-Express, dual-channel DDR-400 and DDR2-667, and not too shabby of an integrated graphics core. A dual-chip solution is less ideal than a single-chip solution, such as NVIDIA’s nForce 4, because it raises production and development costs. Traces aren’t cheap, and packing more traces on already very complex motherboards can raise costs noticeable.

The north bridge of the RADEON XPRESS 200 is responsible for the DDR/DDR2 memory controller, PCI-Express host interface with 22 lanes, and the integrated Radeon X300-equivalent graphics core. The memory controller of the RADEON XPRESS 200 is quite powerful in terms of flexibility: not only does it support both DDR and DDR2 memory, but it supports those memory types at speeds of 400 MHz and 667 MHz respectively, in both single- and dual-channel configurations. This allows OEMs a greater amount of flexibility in building motherboards based on the RADEON XPRESS 200.

The north bridge’s integrated graphics core, which I’ve already pointed out as being equivalent to a PCIe Radeon X300, is designed to compete directly with Intel’s 915G integrated graphics. The RV380 core is not a Doom 3 or Half-Life 2 monster, but it should allow you to play last-generation games comfortably at close to maximum details. The raw specifications of the graphics core are as follows:

• Full DirectX 9.0 Support (Vertex Shader v2.0 and Pixel Shader v2.0)
• Supports resolutions up to 2048x1536@32bpp
• SmartShader 2.0 allows complex, movie-like 3D effects
• SmoothVision 2.1 improves image quality through anti-aliasing using multi-sampling algorithm with support for 2,4, and 6 samples

Sharp-eyed readers may notice that I mentioned 22 PCI-Express lanes, as opposed to the standard 20. Sixteen of those lanes are used for a PCIe x16 graphics slot, and up to 4 lanes can be used for permutations of x1/x2/x4 slots. The last two PCIe lanes are used for communication with the RADEON XPRESS 200 south bridge, providing a total bandwidth of 300 MB/s between the north and south bridges. This amount of bandwidth is sufficient for most purposes, but it could lead to some bottlenecks when used with a higher-end RAID configuration along with some high-throughput PCI devices.

The south bridge of the RADEON XPRESS 200 contains an integrated audio solution (though our P5RD1-V motherboard is using an external Realtek chip), support for eight USB 2.0 ports, five legacy PCI slots, and four SATA ports. Both the north and south bridge chips can be cooled comfortably by passive cooling, as is seen on our P5RD1-V.