AMD introduces the Athlon 64 X2, Ati debuts Crossfire (PCGH Retro, May 31)

…2005: The processor manufacturer AMD announces the availability of the Athlon 64 X2 processor. The youngest offspring of the Athlon family is a dual-core processor that is delivered with clock frequencies between 2.4 GHz (4800+) and 2.2 GHz (4200+). The most important difference: The models with 2x 1,024 KiB L2 are Toledo CPUs with 233 million transistors, the smaller ones with 2x 512 KiB L2 are Manchester processors with 154 million transistors. The new X2 CPUs can be operated with current Socket 939 mainboards after appropriate BIOS updates. Prices range from $1,001 for the 4800+ to $537 for the 4200+.

…2005: Ati – not yet part of AMD – officially presents its own multi-GPU solution called Crossfire (formerly MVP). As with SLI, two graphics cards are operated in parallel in order to increase graphics performance. However, two identical 3D machines are not required for Crossfire operation. Ati presents various Crossfire Edition cards that can be combined with different Radeon cards of the X800 and X850 generation. In addition, Ati is presenting two completely renewed mainboard chipsets called Xpress 200 Crossfire Edition for the Athlon 64 and Pentium 4. Later, Crossfire will also rely on a direct connection between two normal graphics cards, but in 2005 this is Ati’s answer to Nvidia’s SLI.